


And When It Does I'm Already Gone

by qwanderer, roseapprentice



Category: Iron Man (Movies), The Amazing Spider-Man (2012), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Alcoholism, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Angst, Angst and Fluff and Smut, Drama, F/M, Family Drama, Family Feels, Genderfluid Character, Genderfluid Loki, Humor, Lady Loki, Loki Feels, Loki Needs a Hug, Loki is Peter's mother, M/M, Minor Character Death, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Romance, Sexual Content, Smartass Family, Smut, Tony Stark Needs a Hug, Tony is Peter's father, angst ensues, biological smartass family, fem!Loki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-24
Updated: 2015-01-23
Packaged: 2018-01-02 13:06:09
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 75,111
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1057123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer, https://archiveofourown.org/users/roseapprentice/pseuds/roseapprentice
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eighteen years ago, Tony fell in love with a mysterious woman, all green eyes and wit. Now he’s given up all hope of finding her again, but with curiosity and a well-placed spider, fate has different ideas.</p><p>Loki lies and loves and loses and leaves things unfinished. But the people who love Loki back aren't about to let the past go so easily. And Tony and Peter can dig up their share of secrets when they put their heads together. Biological Smartass Family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Heartbeat with a High Demand

**Author's Note:**

> Written primarily by RoseApprentice. Story and chapters named for Eric Hutchinson's song, “[Okay, It’s Alright with Me](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UM0qzSAxrCM),” which kept going through her head while she was writing this.
> 
> The story takes place in a universe that’s a weird mesh of MCU and The Amazing Spider-Man movie, with a dash of 616. Thor happened ages ago and Loki now is an established Earth supervillain who knows his parentage. Tony went through Afghanistan about a decade early and is already an Avenger. The 2012 Avengers movie never happened. I think you’ll figure out the rest as we go.

 

In autumn of 1997, Loki decided it would be a fun and profitable game to seduce one of the Avengers and see how many secrets and how much access he could gain though it.

Considering his options, he concluded that two of the heroes were palatable to him, and that Stark seemed far more gullible and careless than Romanov.

So Loki set to work, and he started with a few well-placed dreams.

.:.

The first time Tony saw Rebecca, it was in his sleep. It was just an impression, the vague but overwhelming notion of green eyes and dark hair and whispers and _rightness_.

Waking up was like being stabbed. Acute longing and loss, as all that rightness tore away.

Tony lay in bed for a long time, wondering if he could fall asleep again and have the same dream.

Eventually he gave up and dragged himself out of bed, went about his day, and forgot about the dream.

The next night he dreamed of her again. She was soft black hair fanning across his chest and curved, pale skin warm against him. She smirked at him with green eyes that pierced him and ran him through, seeing too much, slicing his soul open with a pleasant sting. He realized he must be dreaming again, because in real life no one had eyes like that.

“Do me a favor,” he said to her. “Don’t let me wake up again.”

She smiled with cruel warmth and kissed him awake.

Tony lay in his bed, too sharp and alert to think about sleeping again this time. It was better than dreaming about Afghanistan, he concluded. These were actually very good dreams, but it scared him a little that he didn’t want to be awake. It didn’t bode well for his alcoholism, and it might really be healthier for him to go back to nightmares.

He hoped he would see her again.

The _third_ dream… The third dream was really something. He was naked -- hadn’t he been naked in the first two dreams? But it took on a whole new significance when she rubbed up against him, lighting a fire in his skin and sparking rightness into _need,_ giving a direction and a focus to all that taking apart she’d been doing. She was present enough that he could wrap his arms around her, and he did, holding on like maybe he could keep her there, and she didn’t seem to object, smiling all smug and knowing down at him and working a hand between them to give him more, tightening deft fingers around him and he was just starting to think that she’d actually get somewhere this time, stick around for the real show when she gave him that insufferable smile and a last squeeze and dissolved into the inky black of night.

Fuck, he was hard as he’d ever been, and alone in the dark of four A. M., and completely, hopelessly obsessed with a woman who was, as far as he knew, a figment of his imagination.

He needed to get out.

.:.

There was some kind of benefit the next evening, wasn’t there? He didn’t really care what it was about or who would be there except that someone there might distract him, might agree to go home with him and fill up the empty space the dreams had left (or just emphasized, he wasn’t sure).

He absolutely prowled, looking for something in particular, he felt, although he wasn’t sure what. Something compelling, something sharp and incisive, something maybe almost violent.

A backless dress caught his eye, or rather the back in it caught his eye, pale skin framed by deep green fabric and hair that fell in loose black curls. The woman tossed her head and turned a little so her face came into view and Tony was hit with a burst of shocking recognition.

She smiled like she recognized him too, like she’d been expecting him. That would have been more than a little odd, except for the part where he was Tony Stark and this was more or less his party. Still, he couldn’t help thinking there was more to it than that, seeing as this was _her_. The one he’d been dreaming about. And hey, maybe she wasn’t so imaginary after all.

Her eyes were just like he recalled them. Faceted green gem work, cut too sharp till they cut at the world in turn. God, he wanted her to vivisect him with those eyes. “Have I seen you before?” Tony asked, voice much more level than his thoughts. He _must_ have seen her, for his dreams to make such an uncanny likeness of a specific person. Maybe a picture. “Are you in modeling? Acting? No?”

“No.” She shook her head and smiled the _you’re-a-sexist-pig-but-I’ll-let-you-off-the-hook-this-time_ smile that Tony sometimes got when he'd drastically misgauged a woman’s educational background. “I work in Particle Physics, actually.”

“Really? Well that’s it then. I must have read one of your articles. I do browse a science journal once in a while. For the headshots of beautiful women.”

That got her to laugh a little. The sound was lovely, but there was an edge of polite facsimile to it, and Tony silently resolved to get a real laugh out her by the time the evening was up. “Tony Stark,” he introduced unnecessarily, holding out his hand.

“Rebecca Porcher,” she offered, placing her fingers into his in a dainty handshake.

Tony shook her hand and then didn't let go. "Rebecca Porcher. Come home with me tonight.”

She raised her eyebrows at his gall, but didn't withdraw her hand. "Do you make a habit of propositioning strangers?"

"Daily. But I know your name, so we're not strangers. That makes you the exception."

Now she did pull her hand free, shaking it slightly as if only just realizing she had touched something slimy. "Lovely," she muttered and started to turn away.

"Wait."

She looked at him and waited.

"Just dance with me." Tony wasn't much for sincerity, but women seemed to melt for it, so he went all out, letting her see a little of the awe he felt looking at her. "You are the most beautiful woman that I’ve ever met, and I would move heaven and earth for you to dance with me. Please."

She didn't melt. She looked pointedly up at heaven, then down at earth, and said, "That, I would like to see."

Tony winced. "Now?"

"Now."

Tony forced himself to shake off his uncertainty and grinned, all flash and confidence again. He pulled out his cell phone and pressed a few buttons. He was actually sending a text message consisting of the words, "Jarvis, HELP!" but, hey, Rebecca didn't know that.

An earthquake passed through, and those who hadn't gathered to watch Tony's attempts at courtship reacted with startled concern. It ended quickly. Tony pocketed his phone and said to Rebecca, "Heaven could take a little longer."

Rebecca looked around at the mild panic and confusion Tony's stunt had created, and when she looked back to Tony, she was smiling her appreciation. "Heaven was never my favorite anyway."

"Dance?"

“Tell you what.” She pulled a Stark Industries business card out of his breast pocket -- how did that get there? -- and wrote her cell phone number on it. “You take me out to dinner sometime. And after that, we'll see.”

“Done.” He glanced at the number and committed it to memory -- 310-555-5654 -- before he tucked the card back into his pocket, stepping closer to her. “How about tonight?”

“It's past eleven.”

“Perfect. We can have a restaurant all to ourselves.”

“You don't give up, do you?”

“Not until you tell me to.”

She smiled, and her eyes twinkled with mischief and games. “Don't give up just yet,” she suggested. “Good night, Mr. Stark.” And then she turned and disappeared into the crowd.

So.

Just because she was real, didn’t mean she was going to make it any easier on him.

He smirked to himself, then to the heavens, wondering what kind of trouble he’d have gotten up to by the time he actually managed to impress her.

.:.

He called her the next day, because why not? He was Tony Stark, and when he wanted to get something done, he devoted everything, pushed the limits and the timetable, and wow, did he ever want to get _her_ done. None of his other projects had a hold on his mind like this. She was it.

She put him off - she apparently didn’t have the same preoccupation; work was the excuse she made, and she sold it with the details she hinted at. And that only made him more intrigued.

He considered the heavens. Dismissed skywriting as too small and _far_ too cliched. The stars? He wasn’t quite that ambitious, yet. _Heaven was never my favorite anyway,_ she had said. But earth was apparently not doing the trick. What did that leave?

Well, if she didn’t _like_ the heavens, all the more reason to _move_ them, maybe to some place farther away and less likely to…

_Oh._ Oh, that was pretty. It was the sort of thing that might rip the universe in half if he wasn’t careful, but it was _pretty._

Much better than sky writing or flowers was the notion of an Einstein-Rosen bridge blossoming across the sky and giving the world a little window to glimpse someone else’s stars.

He called a few of the relevant physicists, gathering data, and told himself firmly that he wasn’t going to be _that guy_ who destroyed reality because he didn’t rigorously test his hypotheses before applying them. At least, not unless this took more than a week.

.:.

Tony’s phone rang halfway across the room, and he almost didn’t pick up for fascination with the simulations running above his desk. Then he saw the number and tripped over his own feet diving for the device. “Rebecca. You… you actually called.”

“You sound so surprised. I heard you’d been talking to Dr. Foster.”

“Oh. I see. You’re jealous,” Tony surmised, settling into his desk chair and smirking.

“Mm. Yes, I go mad with envy when men I’ve only just met go talking to other physicists.”

“ _Excellent._ I’ll put Stephen Hawking on my speed dial.”

“Dr. Foster says you’ve been playing too roughly with the fabric of space. I thought I’d give in and set a dinner date before you go tearing any holes that can’t be mended.”

Tony maintained his composure. Well, he pumped his fist in victory, bounced around a little, and kissed Dum-E soundly. But as far as Rebecca could hear over the phone, he maintained his composure. “How’s seven o’clock?”

“Perfect.”

.:.

They had dinner together. Rebecca was engaging and witty and terrifically smart. Her understanding of her subject rivaled Bruce’s, and Tony was curious what would happen if he put the two in a room together. He resolved not to.

Her hypotheses on the interaction of particles and the types of energy generally referred to as magic were on the cutting edge. Tony drank them in and pushed at them and even managed to ask a few questions Rebecca hadn’t thought of, which always made her look at him with slight, startled awe for a delicious split-second. Tony would just grin back proudly and wait for her answer.

He was falling so very, very hard.

When he finally managed to get her back to the tower -- well, that was usually the point when he was pretty sure he had things in the bag, but nothing was that simple with Rebecca. She teased and stalled and laughed at him and overall made it very clear that things were still on her terms. If he didn’t continue to impress, he thought it was very likely that he’d end up, one more time, lying in the dark alone and thinking about someone who wasn’t there.

But hey, he wasn’t just a pretty face, he was a genius too, and he managed to keep her interested long enough to lure her into bed.

.:.

Her first orgasm was fake. Tony didn't call her on it, and it was really a very nice show, convincing enough on the surface, but Tony trusted his instincts, and – just _no_. A little too _pretty_ , a little too easy, a little too precisely average in terms of noise and motion. It was hot, anyway.

It made him wonder if she was secretly press, because she obviously wanted something from him that wasn't just sex or bragging rights. More likely it had to do with connections in the scientific community. He could set that up, but first he had a point to prove.

He was leaning over her, knees on either side of her right thigh. He rested one fist on the mattress for balance, and the fingers of his right hand were buried in her. Both her hands were wrapped around his cock, soft and conniving, and he worked to focus, focus on the feel of her around his fingers and focus on learning her reactions, but that wasn't getting him any less worked up than her hands were.

Then she was leaning up to trail her mouth along his neck and shoulder and chest, and _god_ , she knew what she was doing, making him gasp every time she bit at that one spot on his collarbone, wandering enough that he never knew when it was coming.

But he knew this game too. He had a good batch of data by now about exactly where she was _most_ most sensitive, so he abandoned gathering data in favor of really using it, fingers stroking deep at one particular spot while his thumb raked hard over her clit. She fell back on the bed, shocked and breathing hard and squirming mindlessly into his touch, and that was much more like it.

He moved forward to lean over her and get a better view of her face, bracing his weight on one forearm. She was in a breathtaking haze, making little cut-off whimpers, and he kept up meeting the desperate motions of her hips with his hand as she lost track of her own hands and they tightened a little too hard around him. Tony just exhaled sharply and increased his pace.

When she really did come, it was quiet. Soundless and broken, her face contorted, her eyes boring into his, pulled apart by every emotion. Fear, pleasure, need, pleasure, anger, pleasure, surprise, pleasure. And this was so much better; this was something he gave to her, something he tore away from her, and he almost followed her over the edge just seeing it.

But he wanted to bring the point home, he wanted to keep her coming back for more after she'd gotten whatever it was she was using him for. So he pulled her hands away from where they still stroked him – a little less coordinated for the moment – and he pinned them over her head instead. He looked her in the eyes and raised his eyebrows. _Is this okay?_

She laughed and arched up to kiss him. He met her and buried himself into that kiss, pushing her flat to the bed again with his weight and trailing his free hand up to her breast. His fingers were wet from touching her further down, and that got him some amazing reactions as he teased her nipple, her sensitivity sharpening with every stroke, until he wondered if he could make her come again just touching that one spot.

Then he shifted up onto his elbows so he could kiss his way downward. First the smooth negative curve of her neck, then a detour along her collarbone and -- whad'ya know -- she had a sensitive spot there; no wonder she had found the same on him.

He let his nose brush lightly over her left nipple, still sensitive from all the attention he had given it earlier. She gasped and her whole body spasmed, hips flexing in an abrupt, uncontrolled reflex, fortunately not enough for her knee to do Tony any harm. Tony just smiled in self-satisfaction and moved on downward.

He felt her fingers lace through his hair. Oh right, he’d let her hands go; not a safe thing to do, that.

She was already getting close again, to judge by the pace of her breathing. He could have cut to the chase, but he’d had a planned order of operations here and he opted to stick to it, tracing out her ribcage with his lips and teeth. The fingers in his hair tightened painfully. “Do _not_ tease me,” she commanded, and her voice was vicious and insistent and it shot through him like electricity -- the very, very good kind.

He tossed his head, angling it up so he could give her a shit-eating grin. “But I’m so _good_ at it.”

“Conceded,” she panted, then let her head fall back and muttered, “If you’ll concede that you’re a conceited bastard and then focus on making me come.” This came with a distinct shove as her hands pushed his head down between her thighs and then released him.

Tony chuckled and readjusted so he could lie comfortably between her legs. Long forgotten were whatever diplomacy or misgivings had led to her earlier show, and this was so much better. He loved her this way, demanding and falling apart.

Between Tony’s mouth and his fingers, it wasn’t long before Rebecca started to climax. Her thighs tightened around his head, muffling his hearing. He couldn’t see her, but he felt her full body shudder as her hips arched up off the bed, and this time he could fuzzily hear her calling out.

He wished he could watch her face, but he contented himself the heat and taste and sound of her as he kept working, licking and stroking and drawing out the shuddering moment, hearing her whimper brokenly as he proved to both of them how thoroughly he could take her apart.

Her body went slack, falling flat to the mattress again as her chest heaved in chasing her lost breath, and Tony was able to look up and take in the way she looked, relaxed and exhausted, her normally derisive mouth curved into a soft, unthinking smile, green eyes looking hazily up at the ceiling, then flitting down to him.

The unguarded moment faded and the look in Rebecca’s eyes turned more predatory. She sat up, took him by the shoulders and rolled him onto his back with force that took Tony by surprise and sent just a little bit of best kind of terror skittering along his nerves. She was still catching her breath but she was _strong_ considering, maneuvering him neatly underneath her as she knelt up and straddled him, rolling a condom down over his cock with a few strokes that had Tony pulling in sharp, shaking breaths.

He was pretty strung out by now, having spent the evening focused on her -- well, having spent the _week_ focused on her -- either way, he’d been waiting for this moment a painfully long time. It didn’t take much from her to have him completely wrecked, and the way Rebecca was looking down at him, she obviously knew exactly how much power she held.

Then she was lowering herself onto him, excruciatingly slow. Tony struggled to breathe effectively while being enveloped by tightness and heat. He would have liked to make it last, maybe make her fall one more time right along with him, but Rebecca had other plans. She leaned over until her mouth was at his ear and she was whispering all sort of lovely things in a silky, sated voice about how he had done so well and now it was his turn to break, she wanted him to come, she would _make_ him come. And Tony’s heart was beating a hasty assent, slamming blood through his body with a force and intensity that was devastatingly out of proportion with the soft, unhurried voice whispering promises in his ear.

There was a moment where Tony could swear he was about to wake up again, that this was all going to melt away and leave him alone and aching for her.

But then she was real and tightening around him and dragging him over the edge, and he was screaming raggedly and emptying into her, completely lost and finding he never wanted to be anywhere but lost in her.

For a while after that he knew nothing but bliss and the sound of his own breathing and the smell of sweat and the feel of her skin as she relaxed and lay down on top of him.

The fog slowly cleared from Tony’s mind, allowing him to run analysis on some of the data he had just collected.

And the conclusions he came to were troubling.

He’d fallen for the _hard to get_ game hook line and sinker, and he couldn’t even find it in himself to want off the hook. Tony sighed and forced himself to ask. “So... what is it?”

Rebecca frowned at him, questioning.

“You're not here for me. So what is it? Money? Connections?”

She scoffed and rolled away, broadcasting annoyance and offended pride, but not enough to make Tony believe he had missed the mark.

Well, he’d managed to get her this close. He wasn’t going to force her away by forcing the issue right now. Tony changed the subject. “So how do you feel about strangely dressed people standing next to hats?”

He could see her struggling to maintain her aloof anger, but she gave up to send him a look of pure consternation.

“I’m thinking the Boulevard for our next date. Broadway. Street performers, traffic, musicals, window shopping with the richest guy on earth… New York City, honey. We could fly in in the morning.”

Rebecca’s eyebrow arched delicately as her confusion morphed to consideration, and finally to acquiescence. “I suppose,” she agreed with a sigh, snuggling closer to his shoulder.

“You don’t have work?” Tony teased.

“I really don’t.”

.:.

The day in New York somehow turned into a week, and Tony entirely blamed his own cleverness, changing the topic every time Becky mentioned scheduling a flight home. There was plenty to distract her with, sights and shows and stores and sex. And he had never enjoyed any of those things so much as he did with her.

He’d had some thoughts of getting the woman out of his system -- Wasn’t that how this infatuation thing usually worked? -- but so far he was just getting more and more fascinated by her, more comfortable with her, and by the time Becky put down her foot and said she really would like to get back to her home and her job, Tony was dreading the idea of spending as much as a day without seeing her.

On their last day in New York Becky stopped at a shop window, where a handbag had caught her eye. It was a lovely, elaborate thing, with shades of dark green fabric, black leather laces and silver clasps. Tony had no idea how one would get the thing open, or even which parts of its mystifying construction were supposed to be pockets, but that was Rebecca in a nutshell.

“You want that?” he asked her.

“Not sure. It looks…” she searched for words. “...Difficult. Tricky. Full of hidden places. You could carry it around and never know what it held.”

“Jesus, you made that sound sexy. Now if you’re not getting it, I am.”

That startled a laugh out of Becky. “You could wear it to your next fundraiser.”

“I’d rather wear _you_.”

Rebecca gave him a look.

“On my arm, y’know.... Um, can I start over? That was supposed to sound romantic instead of chauvinistic and creepy.”

.:.

They arrived home, and the next week went well enough. There was a little of the _hard to get_ game still flavoring their interactions, but Rebecca’s heart didn’t seem to be in it anymore, and so far he had convinced her spend all her nights at his house at Malibu Point.

This morning she had woken him up just after five a. m. to go another round, and now they were both tiredly staring up into the pre-dawn darkness and making lazy, unthinkingly personal pillow talk. The subject had turned to Tony’s father and he listened to himself casually divulging his deepest insecurities, and thought distantly that this was weird and he should probably be concerned.

“...I’m honestly not sure if he hated the whole _having a son_ deal or if I was special,” Tony concluded.

“At least I don’t have to wonder,” Rebecca mused wryly. “I know I was special.”

Tony smothered a little burst of excitement when he realized Becky might also be too fucked out to keep up her usual walls. “Then you had siblings,” he prompted.

“One. Not a _real_ sibling, just -- I was adopted. My father… he had a very specific purpose in mind when he took me in. I didn’t even know I wasn’t one of them until I figured it out on my own. Our family was always complicated.”

“Money?”

“Yes. Quite a lot. My brother inherited. I didn’t.”

“The Porcher folks sound like a real treat.”

The sky outside was lightening enough that Tony could make out Rebecca’s sad smile. “Porcher isn’t the family name. My father renounced me, so I took the name of my biological father.”

“Ever meet _him?_ ”

Her mouth twisted in disdain. “I did have that misfortune, yes.”

“Not gonna touch that. But really, you got _renounced?_ Seems a little harsh. And archaic.”

“Well, I _may_ have acted out a little first.”

“Why do I get the feeling there’s a story behind that that I really want to hear?”

“There are a few stories behind that.”

“...Yes?”

“‘On the grounds that it may incriminate me,’” she quoted.

“One. Please.”

She sighed and made a show of giving in. “So my father has a vault in his basement where he keeps his valuables. You know the rich collector type.”

Tony thought of his vintage cars and motorcycles and said nothing.

Rebecca leaned in to Tony’s ear and said in a stage whisper, “I gave the basement key to some unsavory characters.”

Tony leaned back and gave her a wide-eyed look, horrified and impressed. “How much did they take?”

“Nothing.” She shrugged. “They got caught. I knew they would. I did it to prove a point, and it worked.”

“Not just a cry for attention, then?”

“No.” Rebecca smiled to herself. “I’m actually not sure if daddy dearest ever figured out that was me. I know the doorman suspected.”

There was something unsettlingly casual in her tone. The story didn’t bother Tony; he would have happily screwed over his father to a similar degree. But the way she spoke of it hinted at a thousand other times, a thousand other secrets and deceptions. Like something in her had cracked that wasn’t meant to crack, and she had built her life around the break in such a way that nothing was healed and everything could be a lie.

“You’re a little bit insane, aren’t you?” Tony queried.

Rebecca propped her head up on her hand and eyed his face, her expression guarded, but not quite completely guarded. Tony could swear part of her was preening, flattered that he had noticed. “You beg me to tell you _one_ story, and then you call me insane when I tell you?”

“Yeah. So tell me another.”

She laughed gleefully, and didn’t. “It’s your turn. Tell _me_ something.”

“What do you want to know about?”

She shrugged a little too casually. “You. The Avengers. Your life with them.”

He gave her another long look, and the teasing mood fell flat. “So it _is_ the press.”

Rebecca opened her mouth to voice a sharp denial, but stopped. The look in Tony’s brown eyes wasn’t suspicion. It was resigned, unsurprised hurt. It was the look of someone who had been used for what he had so many times that he’d never expected more from her to begin with.

Loki felt distinctly uncomfortable under that look. Playing a role was good fun, but in this she hadn't so much fooled Tony as rubbed salt in his wounds by failing to fool him.

“ _I’m_ not press.” Rebecca said it like the half-truth it was, as close to an apology as she would come.

“But someone you know is.”

Rebecca shrugged again, looking away.

Tony nodded to himself, taking stock. “So… this someone. They’ve got leverage over you? Or is this more like… a mutually beneficial arrangement? You volunteer because it’s fun to be on the arm of a billionaire for a while?”

Her mouth drew together distastefully. “Not either of those, not precisely. It’s more a question of… keeping up appearances. With the wrong kind of people.”

“‘The wrong kind of people’? So… What, your family?”

She gave him a brief, wide-eyed look, like he had entirely missed the mark and somehow hit upon something much more true. Then she was all distance and chill. “I’m late for work,” she lied, rolling out of bed.

“You’re not. You have twenty-three minutes before you usually leave.”

“I have an early meeting.”

“Yeah. Right.”

.:.

She came over again that evening, so apparently Tony was forgiven for the morning’s insight.

He let the topic drop, let himself half-forget it, let himself enjoy the dream while it lasted.

.:.

He’d been seeing Rebecca for a month when Pepper intruded on his workshop to talk to him about it.

“So. This girl Rebecca,” Pepper prompted.

“What about her?”

“Tony...”

“I’m going on dates with a beautiful girl. That’s normal.”

“Just one girl for a whole month? Not normal for you.”

“Maybe I want to settle down!” he said defensively.

Pepper cut to the chase. “She’s a gold-digger, Tony.”

Tony sighed and ran his hands over his eyes. “...I know.”

Pepper looked at him sadly. “Then you can’t stay with her.”

“I can do whatever I want.”

“And this is what you want? After everything? After Obie? You want to be with someone who may not even care about you?”

Tony didn't have an answer for that, so he turned his focus back to his machines until Pepper left.

.:.

Tony and Rebecca sat together on his living room couch. They had managed to distract each other with arguments and formulae for a while, and the evidence was notes and science journals scattered across the coffee table.

But as the day wore on a quiet had crept in, and now it refused to go unheard.

There was always tension between the two of them, of one kind or another. Of course he’d known for a while now that Rebecca had mixed feelings about her ulterior motives for being here. It was obvious, on the rare occasion he’d gotten her to talk about it. But -- and this he’d chalk up to his prodigious skill at denial -- this was the first time he’d been unable to avoid the question of what they were mixed _with_.

Pepper was right. Pepper was always right, one way or another, and he trusted her like nobody else. The Avengers had his back in battle, and Rhodey, any day of the week, they all got to save his skin and use his (lent, not sold, never again sold) weapons. But Pepper was the only one he let into his head, let her words have this kind of leverage. She had asked the question. _This is what you want?_ And now his mind wouldn’t be able to put it down, put it to rest, not until he answered it.

And Becky could tell, she could feel it, of course she could. The question was between them like a wire, either waiting to twine them together or cut them apart.

She broke the silence first. “What do you want from me?”

“A straight answer.”

She lifted her chin a little to give him a level stare. “Alright. I think I can guess the question. Which answer would you like?”

Tony exhaled a breath of laughter that was nine parts aggravation and one part heartbreak. He opened his mouth to say _the truth._ Then he looked into her eyes and accidentally asked for what he really wanted. “Make me believe that you’re here for me.”

Rebecca regarded him coolly. “What do you think I’ve been trying to do? I give you my presence every day, and my body every night. What do you suggest I do to put on a better show?”

Tony felt a queer, cold knotting in his stomach; he was fairly certain his innards were trying to tie a noose to hang themselves from. He opened his mouth to speak, but he was mute, much like he’d been last time someone tore his heart out.

Becky watched him, still cold, but something like regret flashed through her eyes. “I should go.” She stood and started packing her notebooks back into her bag. “I should have ended this a long time ago.”

Tony watched her hands deftly tighten the laces on her packed handbag. It didn’t make sense. The sooner she ended it, the less she got. Anyone else, it might have been guilt, but this was Rebecca, and she didn’t break along normal lines. She should have ended this a long time ago, she said.

Something in her had broken a long time ago. Nothing was healed and anything could be a lie.

Anything could be a lie.

_Anything._

Oh.

_Oh._ Tony’s eyes widened and snapped to hers. “Stop.”

“What?” Those faceted green eyes narrowed in confusion.

“Stop.” He stood, snatched her bag from her and started scattering the notebooks across the table again. “Stop packing. Stop leaving. Stay right there.” Tony dropped the bag and faced her. “I get it now. Stay here. Just listen. Now, you came here because you wanted something. Information, money, I don’t know, and I don’t care anymore. Because _you_ don’t care anymore. You care about me. That’s the only reason you would leave.”

“You’re deluding yourself.”

“Maybe, but you’re sabotaging yourself by leaving if you still want more of my money.”

“Really? Do you know how much I could sell this story for? ‘ _My month with Tony Stark_.’”

“A lot less than you’d get if you married me.”

“ _What?_ ”

Tony winced. “No. Sorry, I’m doing this all out of order.” He held his hands in front of him, palms facing each other in an _I need to say this clearly_ gesture. Stepping closer and looking intently into her eyes, he said with slow certainty, “What I am trying to say is, _you’re in love with me._ ”

Rebecca leaned back, her eyes still locked on his. She must not have realized yet that she was crying, because her face was still a mask of hateful disdain. “What a lovely confession,” she scoffed, and walked away.

She didn’t go far. He followed her around the corner and found her sitting in a kitchen chair, looking at nothing and shaken by whatever she saw there.

“Do you love me?” Tony asked.

“No,” Rebecca said without looking at him, and it was such a transparent lie that Tony grinned. She looked up at him despairingly. “Yes.”

He knelt down in front of her chair so he could rest his hands on her thighs and look up into her eyes, worshipful of all the clever, terrified chaos there. “I love you too,” he said, and meant it until it hurt, until everything that was him left him with the words because he would rather be in her. “I love you.”

Her face twisted, broken by that. She slumped forward so her forehead rested against his, and cried in horror at the fact that he loved her.

.:.

Loki whispered a spell over her drink to strengthen it. She needed a stiff drink or ten, now that she was apparently in love with a mortal. And the mortal in question was already inebriated by the wine they had been sharing throughout the evening. It was time she caught up.

She took a long pull from the strengthened wine and it burned with satisfying intensity. Then she settled against Tony’s shoulder and let herself fall into a blur of contentment.

“I dreamed about you,” Tony admitted a while later, “Before we met. Had dreams and you were in them.”

“I know,” Becky said, then looked down at her wine glass accusingly. That spell might have been a little _too_ strong.

Tony looked up interestedly. “Really? Did you dream about me too?”

“Something like that.”

Tony smiled, pleased by the notion. “So I figured out that you’re in love with me…”

“Yes,” she agreed acidly. “You mentioned that.”

“Let me finish. I figured out _that_ you’re in love with me. But I didn’t totally figure out _why_.”

“Fishing for compliments?”

“Yup.”

She turned her head to really consider him. This man had given her his heart, and it was a heart very much worth having, so maybe she owed him this. But the heart was given under false pretenses. She couldn’t keep it. More lent than given, then.

Somehow, that made her feel more indebted, not less.

Rebecca rolled her eyes and answered him. “You’re intelligent, attractive, powerful…” The obvious, inane things, but Tony was already grinning.

“It’s not easy to fool you,” she said more slowly. “You challenge me. You scare me. I scare you. You know what it is to betrayed, and you know I might, and still you want to take the risk.” _You’re a gullible fool._ “You’re brave for me. And you’re lost. When you’re most afraid, or most in love -- well, same thing -- you look at me like a confused, terrified child might. It’s a bit like looking in a mirror.”

Loki was definitely drunk.

She paused when she realized this, and as soon as she stopped speaking Tony leaned in to kiss her fiercely, and she forgot all thoughts quickly thereafter.

They tugged and twisted clumsily out of their clothes, the textures of skin and cloth vivid under their fingers. Just touch was overwhelming, driving all capacity for caution out of their drunk, love-addled minds. Once all the cloth was gone and there was only skin, Rebecca shifted to straddle him and didn’t hesitate in lowering her hips and sheathing him, delighting in the gasps of shock and overwhelmed pleasure Tony answered with. She rode him, and for a long time her eyes bored into his, hungry and loving, vivisecting him and breathing him in.

Then she started to fall apart, heard his name leaving her mouth over and over again, “Tony, Tony, _Tony…_ ” and she had just enough controlled thought left to wish she had never let him see her like this, before the wave hit and she lost all capacity to wish anything different or altered.

It was all drunken and messy and reckless and perfect. It took a spell from Loki before Tony could properly come with the alcohol in his system. That was another careless move on her part, but Tony was much too far gone to notice. The sporadic motion, the sound of him calling out, it was all magnified in stillness and heat, all jarring her soul with pleasant shakes as if she was someone so _easy_ to catch off guard. Damn him, how did he make it seem so easy? “Damn you,” she whispered, and heard him laugh -- more jarring, pleasant shakes.

Some time later they stumbled into bed, and they tangled themselves together and they slept.

.:.

Loki woke before Tony. She lay in the early morning stillness and the knowledge settled in on her, with all the certainty of a shapeshifter in her own body, that she was pregnant.

She looked down at her still flat stomach, pushing the sheet aside to glide a caressing hand over the skin there. “Can you imagine that, Tony?” she whispered, knowing full well that her lover was asleep. “A child half you and half me? How miserable and lovely a creature that would be.”

Secrets had a cost, she knew, and the heaviest cost was more secrets. Sooner or later she would _have_ to leave him, and to tell him him about this child would be all the crueler. He would either be angry that she had made him a father or angry that she hadn’t let him be one.

So when Tony woke, she didn’t tell him about the boy growing inside her.

.:.

Rebecca moved in after that, and they started the work of settling into each other’s lives. One of the first hurdles was introducing her properly to Pepper. The two women had so far ignored each other on a shared assumption that Rebecca would only darken Tony’s doorstep until the inventor came to his senses. New circumstances -- the couple’s newfound love and doomed half-engagement -- now rendered that impasse impractical. Tony stalled.

Fate was against him, and Pepper inevitably came down to his workshop on business while he was teaching a surprisingly interested and grease-covered Becky the ins and outs of properly caring for a 1932 Ford Flathead Roadster. Becky had traded in her usual formal attire for jeans and an overlarge T Shirt that persistently slipped down off one slim shoulder or the other.

Pepper walked into the workshop and came to stop when she realized who else was there.

Becky cleaned her hand on a nearby rag and held out a hand to Tony’s secretary. “Miss Potts, I don’t think I’ve ever introduced myself properly. I’m Rebecca Porcher.”

“She’s here to stay,” Tony confessed.

Becky didn’t quite wince at those words. Tony wasn’t looking, but Pepper caught the suppressed look. “Miss Porcher,” Pepper greeted with icy politeness.

This was going badly. “Tony speaks very highly of you.”

Pepper smiled. “Really? That’s so sweet. I wish I could say the same.”

Loki thought, _I like her._ Rebecca sent Tony a questioning look.

“Okay,” Tony clapped his hands. “I think that’s enough introducing for one day.”

Pepper was still smiling acidly. “Actually, I’d like a chance to speak with Becky in private.”

“Sounds lovely,” Becky agreed, and they headed upstairs together while Tony looked on in dread.

Once they were upstairs, Becky sighed and tried again. “I really am in love with Tony. I know you’re important to him. I hope we can become friends.”

“Not while you’re still lying to him.”

“I’m not-”

“Don’t.” Pepper raised an impatient hand to cut off Rebecca’s denial. “Seriously, just don’t. Are you going to break his heart?”

“I-” Damnit, this woman was _good._ “Not without breaking mine with it,” Rebecca said firmly.

Pepper looked at her for a long moment, and finally nodded a little. “That’s not good enough.” And she walked away.

.:.

Tony was sitting still, his only motion twisting a screwdriver buried in the workings of the engine before him. He didn’t move to acknowledge Pepper’s return.

“Tony, talk to me.”

Tony kept turning the screw, but he talked. “I’m going to marry her.”

Pepper crossed her arms. “Really? She agreed to marry you?”

“I asked. She hasn’t said yes yet, but I’ll convince her! Look, I don’t know what her game was, but it’s over. She loves me, and she’s right for me. I’m not letting go of that.”

“I don’t trust her.”

“I do. I didn’t, but now I do.”

“You’re going to get hurt.”

“She’s worth it.”

“No, Tony, she’s _not._ You’re more than-”

“It’s _my choice,_ ” Tony said in a tone that brokered no argument. “You can with live it, or you can go.”

The silence that followed was a hard, lonely one, the air in the workshop turning cold and expansive with the distance that might come between Tony and his dearest friend.

Tony put down his screwdriver and did his best to find the words to soften it. “I love you, Pep. I trust you more than anyone else. More than I trust Becky. I don’t know if I could live without you. But I _know_ I couldn’t live without her, because under all the crazy, no one’s as much like me as she is. I’m asking you not to make me choose.”

Pepper’s face softened and her hands fell to her sides. “Tony, I’m scared that she’s not who you think she is. But if you’re right and she really is _that_ much like you, I can probably learn to tolerate her sooner or later.”

.:.

The weeks moved forward, with Pepper and Becky trying for Tony’s sake to get along, but unable to resist using their natural talents for making polite, barbed comments that cut wickedly deep.

Christmas came. Tony bought Rebecca an enormous stuffed kitten, which disappeared under mysterious circumstances soon after. Tony offered to buy another, and Becky adamantly dissuaded him. Still, it was a nice Christmas, and Tony sort of understood now the fluffy warm feeling that people who had actually functional families seemed to associate with the holiday.

Then, and for about six weeks after, Tony Stark was happy.

.:.

It was on a cold day in February that Tony started awake and Rebecca was gone. Part of him knew immediately, had seen this coming, had seen the way she looked at Tony like he was something she couldn’t keep.

Most of him had called that part paranoia. Part of him knew, but most of him disbelieved. “Jarvis, where’s Becky?”

A pause, then Jarvis’s confused voice. “I’m not sure, Sir.”

“You’re. Not. Sure.”

“Someone has interfered with the sections of my programing dedicated to tracking her. Shall I reboot?”

“Just keep running and don’t open or save any files. I’ll check you for viruses in a minute.”

Tony got out of bed, barely stopped to put on pants, and checked the house. Bathroom, main room. She’d taken her things from the closet. Workshop, no. Roof, no. She wasn’t outside. He checked his cell phone, and her number had been erased. He dialed it from memory, and learned a few moments later that the number was disconnected.

He checked Jarvis. No virus, so he set the guy to reboot, but some of Becky's personal information was still missing, and tracking programs rewritten, which Tony had to sort through line by line to put right. The damage was done very precisely, and the alterations in the program were stylistically _her_.

She had left him.

It was intentional, it had clearly required forethought, and she was competent enough to hide so that he would almost certainly never see her again.

She had left him.

The house was empty without her, dead as machines and broken men, and Tony went back to the bedroom, intending to lie in the covers while they still smelled like her.

There was a note on the bedside table, so he walked around to pick it up. A small slip of paper that just read,

    _It was a sincere Love, only kept illusory._

“The fuck does that even mean?” Tony asked the note numbly. He put the paper down and crawled into bed.

Tony crashed three cars that week, somehow didn't kill himself or anyone else, and had his license revoked. The media loved it. His friends watched in horror as he spiraled further down into oblivion.

Somewhere in the middle of a blur of alcohol, he figured out the arc reactor was killing him.

It was a wakeup call to realize that he did fiercely want to live after all, and he recovered far enough to search for alternative elements, but started losing himself again as soon as he realized there were none.

Then there was a SHIELD-enforced detox, some old videos of his dad, an epiphany, and another chance at life.

Tony dragged himself back from the edge, through AA (even though he didn’t feel very anonymous), and on back to the life of a superhero inventor.

He couldn’t call himself happy, or even really content. He was useful. That was what he had. It was the cold, hard rock he had to stand on, and he made do. For a very long time.

.:.

Rebecca Porcher turned into Runa Parker, a single, pregnant woman just settling into a new life in Forest Hills, New York.

Loki had planned it to be a relatively meaningless alias, just real enough to raise her son in anonymity. But the neighbors knocked on her door and invited her to dinner, and before Loki knew what had happened, Runa had friends.

May had a gentle strength that reminded Loki almost painfully of Frigga, and Loki found herself liking the woman immediately. May, in turn, took a fierce motherly interest in her new neighbor, Runa being a woman facing the imminent trials of motherhood -- _apparently_ for the first time -- all on her own. The fact that Runa and May were ostensibly the same age did not deter this dynamic at all, nor did the fact that Loki was in fact a thousand years older than May, and had already birthed and raised several children where May had none.

Thus, Loki found herself with an unexpected ally holding her hand through the trials of pregnancy, more a comfort than she would have imagined amid the loneliness that gripped her.

And the loneliness was a formidable thing, a crippling void where one Tony Stark should be.

When she closed her eyes she could see him smiling at her, kneeling down to kiss her swollen tummy. And when she opened her eyes everything was cold. Cold reality. Cold knowledge that he would have wanted to be here, but she had denied him that.

She had denied him by existing, by being a lie at her core. His love for her was built on a brittle foundation, would shatter at the slightest revelation of truth. Better to let it fade. Better to never see him again. Better to be cold and hurting.

It was in her apartment with the company of May and an utterly superfluous Midgardian midwife that Loki gave birth to a human-looking baby boy and named him Peter.

He was so small, the smallest of all her children save Jormungandr, and Jor had grown out of that phase quickly enough. Peter was small and mortal and likely to stay small and mortal, and in his deep tearful brown eyes, Loki could see all the frailty, all the tragic things that might befall him because she was his mother. All the pain that had come to her because her parents were who they were, all the tragedies of her own children before him, their fates.

In her world of secrets that begot pain and more secrets, she resolved to tell one truth; Peter would know his race. From a young age, even from too young to quite understand, Peter knew that he was half-human. That the other half of him might be Asgardian or Jotun or both. She even showed the boy her Jotun form sometimes. The occasional appearances of “blue mommy,” delighted the boy to no end, leaving Loki shocked and strangely pleased. Peter would even try to turn himself blue, but he never manifested shapeshifting abilities, so that notion remained only a child’s fantasy. He did, however, show a little of the strength and durability of Asgardians. His intelligence rivalled Loki’s at a comparable age, and his insight far surpassed it.

She taught him to read people, to question and discern their motives. She taught him to hide his strangeness from the world, but not from her. She taught him to lie, so that she could safely tell him truths. She doted on him and loved him fiercely and in some moments, with Peter in her arms, Loki very nearly felt whole.

Peter knew his mother as Runa. She told him nothing of Loki, and her life outside their home. She told him nothing of his father, and when Peter asked, she simply said, “Don’t,” with gentle finality.

But she told him secrets. Magics and mysteries, and stories of unnamed relatives and pranks played on them.

Secrets, as she had not forgotten, had a cost.

In 2005, Stark Tower went up in New York, bringing clean energy and a world of scientific research, and a much harder world for the criminal element local to the city. There came desperation, alliances and backstabbing. A few of Loki’s associates -- the few she had kept in touch with to keep an eye on their long term plans -- saw fit to give what information they had about her to SHIELD in return for shortened sentences and the overlooking of minor incidents.

That in itself wouldn’t have been a problem, but favors went both ways, and some of Loki’s least favorite allies from the old days had the means to track her with minimal information, and that could end badly for Peter. The only thing for it was to appear on radar with a vengeance, somewhere far away that wouldn't lead anyone back here.

SHIELD knew she was in New York. It was time she moved.

.:.

When Peter was seven, his mom left. “You have to stay with May and Ben for a while. If anyone asks, they are your aunt and uncle. Yes?”

“Yes,” Peter confirmed. He was old enough to understand that his mom’s pretend games could be deadly serious, and he would remember the parameters of this one.

“Whatever happens, Peter, never doubt that you are wanted.” She kissed the top of his head with fierce affection, as if she would never let go.

Then she let go.

And she left.

And he waited.

A very long time.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Loki chose the name “Rebecca Porcher” because it means loosely, “one who herds swine into a trap.” “Runa” means runes or secrets, and “Parker” is what Loki got when she mashed together “Porcher” and “Stark.”


	2. I would never Shy from a Fight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki can get pretty violent when you threaten what's his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Had to add an archive warning when we looked over this chapter and noticed all the gruesome death. Not described in too much excruciating detail, though.

Peter’s mom had left money with his uncle and aunt, enough that raising a child wouldn’t add too much of a financial burden, but when the crash of ‘08 came and both Uncle Ben and Aunt May lost their jobs, they would have been in trouble even without Peter to support. All that money started disappearing much too fast.

At ten years old, Peter took up studying finance law to see if he could dissolve his college fund into liquid assets, but his mother had set it up like Fort Knox. She had probably been scared that he would try to give it to his aunt and uncle. Well, she was right, but it was stupid of her to stop him.

Of course, May and Ben were horrified when they found out what he had been trying to do for them. “We will find a way, Peter. You do not need to throw away your future for us.”

The two adults did eventually find employment, and they all limped along.

 

 

.:.

In 2016, the spring after Peter turned seventeen, the plumbing in the basement sprung a leak. Peter searched around for anything he might want to keep that Uncle Ben hadn’t already moved, and found his mother’s old handbag. After dinner, he locked himself away in his room to examine the find.

It was worn, the green fabric faded to a yellower shade, and brown where it had touched the basement floor. Still beautiful, though. Dark grey leather laces, tarnished silver clasps, and pockets in pockets in pockets. Searching every one, Peter found three pens, a folded up science journal, a notebook with a few equations, and a tube of deep red lipstick.

Feeling whimsical, Peter dabbed a little onto his own lip, remembering a time when he had watched Mom go through the same motions. When he had wished fervently that he could turn himself all royal blue and scarlet just like she sometimes did. He replaced the lid and put the tube down, neatly lining it up with the pens and papers, considering them.

Peter picked up the bag again to move it aside, and stilled.

The bag was too heavy, he realized. He hadn't found nearly enough keepsakes to justify the weight of the bag when he'd carried it up to his room, and it hadn't really gotten lighter from being emptied. He rechecked all the pockets and rubbed the cloth hard between his fingers to check for double layers of fabric, but found none. There was no way to explain what could be holding down the bag with so much force.

Which meant it must be magic.

Peter dropped the bag in his lap and blew out a long breath, examining it. The revelation was exciting and disappointing. There was something else in here, and Peter couldn't get to it without a spell he probably didn't know and abilities he definitely didn't have. "Open sesame," he muttered, but nothing happened.

He put it aside again and looked at what he had found. He read the science journal and learned a little about what the cutting edge of particle physics had looked like eighteen years ago.

The notebook contained mostly formulae, but turned to prose ten pages in. Peter started reading and realized it was an early draft of an article that would fit right into the journal he had just read. He hadn't known his mom studied particle physics, but she obviously knew the field inside and out.

Peter stopped after a phrase that caught his attention, and read it again.

_...the satisfying and baffling nature of the simple yet unexpected solution, of a problem turned on its head and thereby revealed in its true nature._

Peter dropped the notebook and picked up the bag again, taking one end of the strap in each hand. "This can't possibly work," he whispered, then he flipped the bag upside down and shook it so that it fell inside-out.

A bulk of objects fell visibly with the motion, settling into the bottom of what was now the inside of the bag. Grinning, Peter reached in and pulled out the contents: two sheathed throwing daggers.

Score.

Peter unsheathed one to look at the blade. About four inches long, it shone like it had just been sharpened and polished. The handles and sheaths were decorated with simple representations of snakes and wolves and other animals, along with lettering that Peter was willing to bet was Asgardian. He lined those up next to the lipstick.

Without the knives, the bag was light enough to be empty. Still, he rechecked all the pockets, and this time his search yielded one small, rectangular business card.

There was a knock at his door.

“One sec, One sec!” Peter called. He put away the daggers and then shoved the bag the other way out, miraculously not spilling the daggers on the floor in the process. In one short flurry of activity he made an intentional mess of his neat pile of finds, pocketed the card, used his sleeve to scrub the lipstick off his mouth as well as possible, sat in his computer chair, and unlocked the door.

It was Ben. “You okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” Peter gestured him in.

“Listen, um…” Ben stepped into the room, looking for words. “I don’t have much education. You know that, Peter. We’re simple people, not like your mom, not like you. Puzzling out what you need… well, maybe you can understand if we haven’t been the best at it. I know it’s been rough for you without your mom, and I know we don’t talk about it much.”

“That’s alright.”

Ben sat down on Peter’s bed. “No, that’s not alright. Now look. Your mother was a very secretive woman.”

“I know.”

“When she left, she asked us to hold onto that bag. Claimed it was no big deal, but then she _insisted_ that we make sure you take it if you ever moved out. I don’t know if that’s any help to you….”

“Thanks.”

Ben nodded and stood to leave. “She’s pretty,” he said, gesturing to the picture of Gwen on Peter’s computer on his way to the door.

“Yeah.”

"Oh and Peter?" Ben pointed at the red smear on Peter's sleeve. "Don't wipe that stuff on your clothes. Your Aunt May is gonna have a fit when she does the laundry."

Chagrined, Peter gave a little salute. "Yes, sir."

Once Ben had slipped out again, a warm but slightly teasing smile on his face, Peter dug out the card again and took a closer look at it.

It had the Stark Industries logo, along with the phone number, email, and street address of a company location in California. A second phone number was written on the back in his mother’s handwriting. Peter dialed that number and got an automated message informing him that it was disconnected.

Had his mom worked at Stark Industries? He flipped the card over and dialed the number in the front.

It rang a few times, and then, “Stark Industries, this is Fred. How can I help you?”

Peter froze for a moment, then spoke up. “Hi! Um, I’m looking for Runa Parker. Does she still work there?”

“One moment please.” The voice went silent for a while. “I’m sorry, we don’t have anyone here by that name.”

“Maybe -- maybe she moved to a different location. Do you know when she left?”

“I’ll check the computer. Spell the name out please?”

Peter did.

“Do you have a security clearance code?”

“No.” Peter frowned. “Should I?”

“Not that I know of. No record of a Runa Parker ever working at Stark Industries.”

“...Okay. Well, thanks anyway.”

“You know, some of the work we do here is classified. Just because _I_ can’t find her doesn’t mean she’s not in the system. You might want to try contacting her some other way.”

“Oh. Thanks. That helps. Yeah. Thank you very much.”

“No problem. Have a nice day.”

“Bye,” Peter said before hanging up.

Well, there was always going to be more than one wrong way to solve a puzzle, Peter thought, remembering the things his mother had taught him. Time to try them all until he found a right one.

First, he stopped at the school library and used one of the computers there to do some tentative hacking, feeling his way around the Stark Industries firewall just enough to know that it was impenetrable by purely electronic means.

Well, okay. Anyone who halfway knew what they were doing could make their computers hack-proof.

Making the people who ran the computers hack-proof? Way harder.

 

 

.:.

Peter stood at the foot of Stark Tower and looked up. Stories and stories of glass and gleaming metal, and one name lettered grandly across the top. It was a towering testament to human ego, or possibly just the fact that one particular human wanted history to know that he was compensating for something.

It was also a glittering hub of cutting-edge technology and the people smart enough to make it.

Ideally what he’d be looking for was a few empty offices and the papers of someone careless enough to leave their passwords written down, but he’d settle for the empty office and a few minutes with a computer wired to the main R&D section LAN. He swiped a security badge from a table full of them while the woman watching over them wasn’t looking, clipped it on, and just generally tried to stride around like he knew what he was doing.

The R&D floors were full of things that were difficult not to gape at, equipment he’d heard of but never seen, people manipulating 3D models of all kinds of nonexistent prototypes, glowing graphs full of data on everything from the DNA of houseplants to the EM spectrum components of known magical phenomena.

Peter got a hold of himself and looked around for doors that might lead to enclosed offices, places that might yield casually abandoned passwords or secure network connections. There was a promising little short hallway off one corner of the lab space he found himself in, and he tried a few doors, learning their passcodes through casual observation of the people coming in and out.

One room contained a small manufacturing facility, packaging some sort of cartridges full of a high-tech textile, it looked like, and although it didn’t seem like it would be particularly beneficial to Peter’s main objective, he was unavoidably intrigued, and backed up by his mother’s remembered voice in his head, saying, “If you have the opportunity to learn secrets, don’t hesitate to take it. Knowledge is power.” So he slipped through the inner door to see where that material was actually coming from.

There were a lot of spiders in this room.

That didn’t particularly bother Peter; he’d been a kid who liked bugs, not just in the “oh, look, it’s gross, I can bother other people with it” way that some boys did, but more fascinated by how they went about their business in the unseen world beneath the notice of most humans, how they took what they needed when they could because the whole larger-scale world was against them. So he knew spiders wouldn’t bother him unless he disturbed them.

Unless, of course, they got disturbed some other way.

The framework of machinery around him lurched, dislodging a rain of spiders, and he wasn’t quite as sanguine about having them all over him, especially not knowing what all had been done to them to make their webs useful in the industrial process going on in the outer room. He shook himself vigorously, and once he thought he’d gotten the majority of them off his clothing, he got the hell out of dodge before it happened again.

He took a couple of deep breaths before heading out into the main room again, and he found a tour group to fall in with while he settled himself and got a feel for where would be a better place to look for, you know, computers. What he’d come here for. And the tour might be interesting; the person who was leading it told them about the data on magic and what it might mean, before turning the group over to - shit, was that Gwen?

It was Gwen. Peter was dead. Peter was utterly and completely dead.

He managed to hide at the back of the group for a while, because he realized that at this point, leaving would make Gwen 300% more likely to notice him. So when the group went up a floor and Gwen introduced two new scientists, he was there, standing at the back, head down but still drinking everything in with fascination.

“Welcome to the biomedical and genetic engineering floor,” she said. “These are the heads of our current project, Dr. Aldrich Killian and Dr. Maya Hansen.”

Aldrich Killian walked with a cane and significant difficulty. He spoke with a nervous excitement that made it clear he believed in the Extremis project, wanted it to work more than anything, and Peter could kinda see why.

The basic principles, as he outlined them, were fascinating. He wanted to ramp up human ability, drastically improve and accelerate the healing process as well as pretty much every area of biological function.

“But there are problems,” Dr. Hansen said, half at the tour group and half reminding the overexcited Killian. “The faster the reproduction rate of cells, the faster the telomeres disintegrate. But if you find a way to eliminate that limitation, you get a whole host of other problems. Persistent protein inconsistencies. Cancerous growth. And in extreme cases, a huge amount of waste energy, too much for the body of even an Extremis-enhanced individual to handle. Anyone got any idea how we might be trying to compensate for that?”

There were a couple of questionable ideas shouted out from the tour group, and Peter thought through the problem as they were answered, going through what he knew of telomeres.

“You’d have to program in some really selective genes to moderate telomerase levels,” he said. “A genetic algorithm, taking a ton of factors into account, before switching telomere rebuilding on or off.”

The scientists blinked at him, nodding. Aaand… Gwen had spotted him. Yup. Great.

“That’s what we’re trying to do,” Killian said, smiling at him.

A more skeptical Hansen asked, “And you are?”

He just smiled awkwardly, but Gwen covered for him, obviously a genius and way too awesome for words. “He’s one of Midtown High’s best and brightest. Peter Parker. He’s second in his class.”

“Second?” Peter managed, “You sure?”

“Pretty sure,” she replied in a self-assured tone that made Peter grin dorkily against his will.

The tour group dispersed a little to look around, and Gwen walked up to Peter to chew him out, but was interrupted when Dr. Killian called, “Mr. Parker.”

Peter shrugged apologetically at Gwen. “Sorry, I gotta…”

“Just go,” she commanded, and fortunately turned away before Peter winced at a sharp pain in the back of his neck. He reached around and grabbed at the spot, and his hand came away with a large, far-too-shiny spider that had obviously come from his earlier wanderings. That could be problematic. Remembering where he was, Peter trapped the spider tightly in his fist and hastily made his way to the scientist who had summoned him.

“That was an impressive guess, Mr. Parker,” Dr. Killian informed him. “We’ll be seeing more of you around here if you do get the internship.”

“Mm? Right. That. Yeah.”

“What field are you going into?” Hansen asked. “Genetics?”

“Um, I hadn’t really decided yet. Um, genetic engineering would be cool. Those spiders were really something.”

Hansen frowned. “I didn’t realize they were part of the tour.”

“We passed them by pretty quickly, but they looked interesting. I was wondering about them.”

Killian explained, “Before the Extremis project, we were working with incorporating animal healing responses into the human genome. Made some very exciting progress... before the project got shut down.”

“We hit up against some roadblocks,” Hansen elaborated. “The project hadn’t progressed for a while, so Mr. Stark reassigned us. Now Stark Industries uses them to produce super-strong fibers for various applications.”

Peter listened, but his eyes caught on the algorithm on display above the plants. The symbols gave him that niggling, _just on the verge of solving a puzzle_ feeling, and Peter tuned Hansen and Killian out for a second, relaxing and letting his mind wander through the variables. He saw what he was looking for and his mind raced ahead, rearranging the formula according to a slightly more nuanced set of conditions, relying more heavily on the evidence of damaged proteins, more conservative in its production of telomerase.

Peter considered keeping his mouth shut, but hey, why shouldn’t he show off a bit? He might even get an internship or something, which would make it way easier to infiltrate the place for answers about his mom. Peter reached forward and used a finger to sketch out a new algorithm under the old one. After a moment, Maya Hansen caught sight of it and shushed Killian. “What’s that?”

“I just rearranged a couple things, weighed things differently. Seems right to me? It still doesn’t have all the relevant factors, but then, genetics, when do you ever, am I right?”

“That’s a unique approach. I think what I’m seeing here is an algorithm that, in some situations, would even produce _less_ telomerase than the average human body. So you’d be starting with a lower baseline, but Extremis would still respond to injury….”

Peter was feeling oddly queasy. He was realizing that being bitten by a spider may not have been the best idea. While the scientists were distracted arguing about protein configuration, he made his escape and bolted.

The subway ride was… sticky. Then he got home, raided the fridge in front of his guardians in a terrific impression of a teenager on too much weed, holed up in his room, and ate. Halfway through a block of frozen mac ‘n cheese, he noticed the glowing.

It was coming from his mom’s old handbag. One of the metal clasps was giving off a glow of golden light, like a magic charm freshly activated, but what would…? “Oh. Duh. Healing magic, right?” Peter picked up the bag and immediately felt a little less ill. “That spider bite must’ve packed a wallop if it woke you up. Thanks, Mom.”

The bag did not reply.

It also didn’t stop the weird transformation that was afflicting him, and Peter suffered through a weekend of clumsily navigating superstrength and spontaneous adhesiveness.

 

 

.:.

“Dr. House,” Tony Stark greeted.

Aldrich stopped and leaned into his cane. He had been summoned to Stark’s office, an unwelcome interruption from the fast-advancing work he and Maya were doing. “Mr. Stark, please stop calling me that.”

“You got it, Greg. Now, I need to talk to you about Extremis.”

“Great!” Killian answered, as enthusiastic as ever, shaking off the annoyance as he got onto the subject of his work. “We’ve made some real headway today, Mr. Stark. I believe we’ll be seeing results very soon. Next week, at the very latest.”

Tony’s face scrunched in distaste at what he was going to have to do. “Well, here’s the thing, A. K. I’m pretty sure I’ve heard that exact sentence from you before. You’ve made a lot of promises, and exactly nothing has come out of them. And your testing has been really… how do I put this? Violent. I’m not paying you to blow things up, Killian. That’s what I pay _me_ for.”

Killian’s brows drew together. “What are you saying?”

“I’m shutting you down,” Tony answered. “This really shouldn’t come as a shock.”

“You can’t shut down the Extremis project!”

“Um, actually I’m pretty sure it’s my company and I _can_.”

“But there’s so much potential here!” Aldrich insisted. “Just a week… just three more days! I’ll show you results, I promise!”

“I’m really done here,” Tony said, giving him a mock-regretful head shake and sauntering towards the door. “Extremis is a waste of funds, and it’s gotta be let go sometime. Might as well be now. Oh, and, the same goes for you. May want to pack up your desk.”

“This isn’t like before! We’ve really got something!” But Killian found himself shouting at the shining closed door of the elevator, Stark having split, presumably to do something more “worthwhile” than listen to the people he paid to do research for him.

Well, used to pay.

Extremis was almost ready. Extremis was going to work. It was going to revolutionize not just medicine, but the human form itself.

And Aldrich Killian was going to prove it.

 

 

.:.

Peter showed up at school like usual on Monday and headed for the library, thinking that there were a lot of things he wanted to look up, maybe about spiders and what the hell was going on with him, maybe brush up on his genetics and work his way deeper into the Stark R&D department that way. He wasn’t even thinking about his aborted hacking attempt until he saw the small swarm of delivery men in the computer area.

“Hey, so what’s up with those guys?” he asked one of the familiar faces among the small crowd that had gathered.

“A guy showed up from Stark Industries. He said that as a charitable donation they were going to update the school’s computer system. They're taking the old computers and replacing them with all new stuff. Cool, huh?”

“Yeah.” Peter stared at the workers as they set up the new computers and packed away the old ones. He wondered how they had traced Peter’s hacking attempts back this far. “Cool.”

So Peter had a few passcodes, but there was nothing he could do with them, since they could trace any machine he used, and even trying a public library presented a pretty obvious risk to his personal safety, with whatever security cameras might be present. People in black suits with black bags came to mind, along with the creepy medical examinations that could follow if they clued in to the fact that Peter was only mostly of this earth.

Later that day, he saw an opportunity to mess with a bully and he took it, and somehow ended up destroying a basketball backboard. Uncle Ben came to school and said a bunch of really unfair things, and finished by telling Gwen that Peter wore lipstick, so, again, _not fair_.

But somewhere in the middle of denying that last accusation, Peter somehow managed to vaguely imply that he wanted to ask Gwen out, and she mostly said yes-ish, so that was pretty amazing.

 

 

.:.

Then everything went sideways, and Ben had been shot, and it was partly Peter’s fault but mostly someone else’s fault, and Peter’s world narrowed in on making sure that that _someone else_ died too.

So Peter became Spider-Man, and started enjoying the glories and tribulations of being a superhero. At least he knew how to keep a secret.

Weeks went by, and he didn’t find the guy he was looking for.

He had dinner at Gwen’s house. It was awkward and horrible and he made an ass of himself to Gwen’s dad. But the evening ended with a revelation of a secret identity and some _really good kissing,_ so all in all it was totally perfect.

 

 

.:.

Then he came home to more bad news. “We might have to sell the house, Peter.”

Peter sat at the kitchen table with Aunt May and tried to compute what she was saying. “...Can I still go to the same school?”

“I doubt it. Your Uncle and I picked Forest Hills because we could afford a certain life. We can’t anymore. Not for a while now.”

“But... we’ll do something else. I-I could get a job.”

Aunt May gave him a questioning grimace that said, _You can’t even get home at a decent hour._

“I’ll think of something, Aunt May. Maybe I could sell some photographs. Or do some cheap plumbing around the neighborhood. People’ll be looking for a shortcut. And I have some stuff of my mom's I could sell.”

"Peter, you can't do that."

"Yes I can."

"Peter -"

"I can! It's mine."

"It's your _mother's,_ and she asked Ben and me to keep it safe for her."

Peter stood abruptly and heaved his backpack onto his shoulder. "Yeah, well she also dumped me on you, and look how that turned out," he said in a rush, and left the room.

 

 

.:.

And finally, the explosions started.

Fortunately, Gwen was a genius. A connected genius, who could fill him on the weird heat signatures showing up on the police reports, and when Peter made the connection with the Extremis project, could tell him when the project had been shut down, and Killian fired.

And she gave him Aldrich Killian’s street address.

So Spider-Man set about stalking an unemployed scientist for a day. Killian, as it turned out, no longer walked with a cane. And, oddly, he seemed a lot grumpier now that he _could_ walk normally, to judge by the cell phone conversation he was having. “No. No, that is _not_ acceptable. We need to have the president under our thumb _before_ June. That plan requires having Extremis stabilized by next week. You know what it does not require? That you still be breathing next week. I’m on my way over right now, and when I get there, you’d better have _solutions_ for me.”

Peter was starting to think that Extremis messed with mental stability as well as molecular stability. Just a suspicion.

He followed Killian to a classic abandoned-warehouse-type illegal hideout. Peter decided to look around. He wasn’t going to pick any fights yet, not until he knew more.

Well, that was the plan.

Extremis (Peter soon learned in a not-fun way) made subjects freakishly invincible in a fight, and it really didn’t take long between Peter being spotted by one of the warehouse occupants and Peter being tossed into a basement storage room with no windows or breakable walls.

It was a pretty effective cell. Peter sat there, surrounded by concrete and dim fluorescent light, cursing his stupidity and considered possible ways out. They had taken away his web shooters, which might have been great for setting some sort of trap, but that was out...

When the minutes stretched on into hours and no solutions came to him that didn’t require the door to magically open, his thoughts turned to Gwen. Beautiful, brilliant Gwen, who would never know exactly what had happened to him, but who knew enough to guess. If he died, he was going to miss her. Or not. Whatever. Anyway, _she_ was going to miss _him,_ and maybe he never should have gotten to know her to start with.

Aunt May _really_ wouldn’t know. She would just think he’d gone missing, call the police, never find him, keep on wondering… Jesus. Maybe Gwen would be able to explain things to May. She was smart that way. She took care of things. Man, did he ever have an amazing girlfriend. Maybe if he was really, really lucky, he’d see her again.

If he didn’t, it would be all his fault. For creating a monster, for trying to take it on all by himself. For existing. His thoughts spiralled through hope and despair and the weight of blame and it all started to homogenize into dim, twisting dread.

The door opened. There was some sort of commotion, a scuffle between the guard and someone new -- Peter’s intended cellmate, he thought.

Snapping out of his bleak thoughts, Peter pushed off the ground and took his chance to bolt out the door. He was stopped by scalding hot hand that wrapped around his wrist and threw him forcefully back into the room. The new captive landed hard next to him a moment later, and the door slammed shut.

The new guy groaned, obviously having taken more damage from the concrete floor than Peter with his unnatural durability. The man rolled onto his back, and the bloodied, goateed face he revealed was one Peter had seen on newspapers and posters his entire life. “Woah. Tony Stark? Are you kidding me?”

Stark’s eyes slid over to take him in. “Oh, hey, it’s the human spider.”

Peter considered objecting to the mutilation of his moniker, but instead he just shrugged. “Mostly, yeah. You okay, sir?”

The legend of a man in front of him paused to gingerly check his nose for breaks, then sat up with an effort. “Nothing out of commission yet. Anything useful you can tell me about the evil glowing people?”

“They’re the results of a new version of Extremis, created by Aldrich Killian. It ramps up the metabolism to levels that are, well, pretty much insane, now that the telomerized algorithm is in place. The new formula solves the volatility problem. Well, a little. Last I heard, he had it at eighty percent success, but I still can’t believe he’s using it on humans already.”

“I can’t believe you know so much about the Extremis project. I can’t believe Killian does, for that matter. The guy’s such a dweeb, I thought he’d never figure it out.”

“How did you get here?”

Tony leaned back against the cell wall and thumped his head against it unhappily. “I was _trying_ to clean up my own mess. Made a bigger one. It’s a tradition of sorts.”

“ _Your_ mess?”

“I hired Killian. I let him work on Extremis. I fired him. I set up all this to happen. It’s a Stark technology and it’s being used to… to blow stuff up. Everything I make, everything I fund ends up this way if I don’t... I should know by now to keep a close eye on things. I thought I knew how close Extremis was to working, and I was wrong. This is all my fault.”

Peter couldn’t take any more of this. “Look, I’m _sorry,_ okay?!”

“Everything that… Wait _what?_ ”

“This is _my_ fault. I came up with the formula that makes Extremis work.”

Tony stared at him, a little wide-eyed. “When was this?”

“About a month ago. Killian was still working for you. I didn’t realize all this would happen. I thought I might get an internship or something, and… I got it working.”

“Spider-Man was in my tower and no one told me?”

“Um, no, I have a secret identity.”

“Well what do you have that for? Who are you?”

“It’s kind of a secret? And for a lot of reasons, but mostly because the police don’t like me very much. Vigilante, you know?”

“Not really.”

“Yeah, I guess no one minds when _you_ do it.”

There were footsteps and voices outside, and two henchmen -- well, a henchman and a henchwoman -- came in to drag them out of the storage room. Tony and Spider-Man went along with it, not having a better plan. Tony attempted some banter with the guards that fell flat, and finally Tony muttered under his breath, “I feel like you’re going to pull over and snuff me.”

But the guards just took them to another room, this one cluttered with computers, mysterious vials and large, ominous looking machinery.

Killian walked in.

“Okay, who are _you?_ ” Tony inquired.

Killian froze for second as he realized the man genuinely did not recognize him. Then he smiled, unhappy and mean. “Don’t recognize me, T.S.? That’s a shame, because I’m the last person you’re ever gonna meet.”

“Wait. _Killian?_ ” Tony looked him up and down, taking in the changes Extremis had made. “Well, would you look at that.”

“Extremis works, Mr. Stark. And you are going to regret firing me even more than you do right now.”

“Mostly regretting not firing you _sooner_.”

Killian’s jaw clenched and he changed the topic. “I can guess why _you’re_ here.” Killian turned from Tony to Peter. “But how did the small timer get mixed up in something this big? Friend of yours, Mr. Stark?” He took hold of Spider-Man’s mask and pulled it over his head.

Aldrich froze again. “...Peter?”

Peter grimaced at him. “Hey.”

Aldrich smiled slowly. “Well that’s a pleasant surprise. Not only can I get rid of Spider-Man, I can also kill the one boy in the world who might be able to reprogram Extremis. Thank you for making this so easy for me.”

“Hey, whoa, you’re not gonna offer me a job?”

Tony and Killian both blinked at him.

“I could work for you,” Peter insisted. “I know Extremis. I can stabilize it.”

Killian rolled his eyes. “You really think I’m going to fall for that? You risk your life every day to fight bad guys, kid. I don’t need any heroes on my staff. Heroes make messes.”

“Inject it into me! I’ll have no choice but try to stabilize it before it goes critical.”

“Kid, read my lips. _I am not giving you access to that code._ ”

An alarm went off, and lackeys started rushing to check exits and monitors. “That had better not be another hero,” Aldrich growled.

“Oh, it’s not,” replied a silky male voice, and Loki appeared in the middle of the room.

Tony and Peter exchanged _oh god not another crazy villain_ looks while Aldrich spun to face the intruder. “Whoever you are, you’re dead.” The guards move to surround the unexpected visitor, ready to attack at Killian’s command.

Wisely refraining from smiling or otherwise showing his teeth, Loki gave the man a polite nod. “Dr. Killian, how lovely to meet you. I am Loki of Asgard, master of magic and long-time enemy of Thor and his allies. I was hoping you and I could form something of a partnership.”

“And what could you do to help me?”

“I’ve been at the outlaw game quite a while. I can advise you in dealing with SHIELD, and in taking advantage of the hostages you’ve taken.” He tilted his head to gesture at Tony and Peter.

“They won’t be much use when they’re dead. Which, since I’m setting the schedule, will be in about five minutes. So will you unless you can give me a better reason not to.”

Loki raised his eyebrows in a look of too-innocent questioning. “You’re going to kill them? Just like that? How very… unambitious.”

“What do you suggest?”

"Put them to use. You have here two of the finest minds the human race has to offer."

"Yeah, I think some thugs in Afghanistan learned that the hard way."

"I don't suggest you put any hardware in their reach. But think. The finest minds the human race has to offer. Imagine how much the human race might risk to have these two returned to safety. If they thought there was even a fraction of a chance."

"Stark is dangerous."

"So is anything that can bring you glory."

“You want me to _announce to the world_ that I’ve taken hostages. I don’t want that kind of media attention.”

“And that’s where I come in. A known supervillain. I announce that I have them hostage, I use that leverage to gain secrets in return for their safely, and kill them both once I have what I want. Then I share my findings with you, and you have that advantage in dealing with SHIELD. You don’t want the treacherous murder of two captive heroes on your name for all to see. But that precisely what _I_ want on _my_ name.”

Killian looked thoughtful. “Savin. Take the prisoners away for now.” He turned back to Loki. “We can discuss this further. What does SHIELD know that you’re so interested in finding out?”

So for Tony and Peter it was back to the basement room and the waiting game. It wasn’t a long wait, though, because after a few minutes the door opened. Magically. And Loki appeared on the other side.

Tony and Peter stood to attack, but the guard outside the cell beat them to it, coming at Loki from either side with murderous intent. Loki hissed in pain when their skin touched his, but after a struggle he was able to tear their heads from their bodies with relative ease.

Then Loki walked into the room and faced Tony and Peter, crisp black hand marks littering his arms and back. When he saw the fighting pose the two heroes were still assuming, Loki held up his hands in a gesture of peace. “Wait. You haven’t even heard my plan yet.”

Peter gestured his hands in a vague crisscrossing _I’m mixed up_ motion. “You mean the _other_ plan where you _don’t_ barter us for ransom and then kill us?”

Loki nodded once. “I mean the plan where I help you destroy Killian.”

Tony crossed his arms. "So now you're helping _us_ and betraying your fellow bad guy? I thought you guys all worked together under the united cause of evil-y evil."

Loki gave Tony a dispassionate look that hid amusement and any number of other emotions, and Tony found himself suffering from a major bout of intense, inexplicable deja vu.

"When supervillains cooperate, Mr. Stark, they become senators. I've not fallen that far yet."

"So what are you doing here?"

"I have business with Killian. He unknowingly took some things belonging to _me._ I aim to ensure that he suffers immensely, and never knows why." There was really no questioning the vicious hatred in Loki’s voice.

Tony made a show of edging away from the god. "Okay. That's impressively creepy. Remind me never to steal your collection of novelty-sized viking horns."

"I trust you would trip and impale yourself on them before I had to lift a finger."

"Hey, they'd have more style if I did."

Loki actually smiled a bit warmly at that. "In a macabre sort of way, yes."

Peter raised his hand. "If you guys are done casually discussing icky things, I have a plan."

Loki looked to him with the intent, critical interest of a strict professor for a favored student. “Go on.”

“We need to reprogram Extremis -- get rid of the excess heat and make it harmless, but disguise the new programing as a software patch.”

Tony frowned. “That sounds… actually beyond my expertise. At least to do short term. I’m not up on genetics.” He looked to Loki. “Can we do that?”

“ _I_ can’t.” Loki shrugged, then looked intently at Spider-Man. “I suggest we don’t underestimate the boy, though. Let him try.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “I mostly meant like, ‘Can you get him to the code?’ I sort of assume you don’t know your way around an allele.”

“Do you make a habit of these unverified assumptions?”

“Yup. And they haven’t failed me yet.”

Loki’s green eyes brightened like Tony had just stepped into about five different verbal traps at once, and there was that _deja vu_ again, dammit. Loki opened his mouth to say something cutting, and Tony braced for it, part of him somehow knowing the words would slice intimately deep.

“Um, guys?” Peter cut in again. “Back to the topic of the plan… Loki, can you get me to a computer with access to Extremis?”

Loki nodded and held forward one burnt arm. “If you take my hand, I can make you invisible to any passing by in the halls.”

Peter took Loki’s hand and watched both their hands disappear, then he took Tony’s hand a little more clumsily with his left, which made the inventor seem to vanish too. _I’m holding hands with a supervillain,_ Peter thought to himself as they snuck through the halls. _And it’s oddly comforting._

They got to a computer, waited for a guard to walk through, and Peter released both the hands he was holding and started hacking. “So Loki, if you're here then where’s Killian?”

“Still arguing with my clone. His plans for you two don’t sound pleasant. I recommend we make this quick.”

Killian’s firewalls were a joke next to Stark Industries’, so Peter didn’t run into any real problems until he was well into reading over the actual code. Peter made a unhappy noise in his throat as he read.

“Can you do it?” Loki asked softly.

“No.”

“What do you mean _no?_ ” asked Tony.

“I mean, ‘Sorry. I’m not smart enough to infiltrate this software in time.’ Someone’s gonna check the systems and notice what I’m doing long before I’ve put this together. It’s too complex.”

“Let me see that.” Tony shoved Peter aside and looked over the code. “Okay, yeah, same here. I’m making my own copy to take home with me. Maybe we can still use a patch if we have one ready next time we tangle with this guy.” After a pause, he unplugged a thumb drive. “I got it. Loki, can you get us out of here?”

“Yes. This way.” Loki held out a hand to lead them through the next invisible stint, and this time Tony took it.

Bad idea.

Because Loki was hot, yeah, but there was a certain line between thinking someone was pretty to look at and having _chemistry_ with him, and apparently in this instance it was really, really the latter because the touch made a chill climb up Tony’s arm and wash over his body, and it was very much an _I want to do this guy right now_ kind of chill, and there were _so many problems_ with that.

Tony told himself to shake it off, took Peter’s hand with his free one, and followed Loki down another hallway, doing his best to ignore the prickling electricity in his hand and the fantasies playing through his brain about Loki in his bed and Loki up against one of these walls and…

 _Ignore,_ Tony insisted to himself.

Otherwise the escape was going well enough, until they finally reached a door that led out of the building. It was, of course, locked, and guarded by the redheaded henchwoman.

Loki whispered, “The moment I release your hands to fight her, you two will be visible. Hide behind this corner until you see your chance. Then get out the door and far away as soon as possible.” With that he let go Tony’s hand, and two heroes appeared again, immediately dropping each other’s hands as well.

Loki did not materialize, and it was only when the guard froze and turned to block a blow she had sensed coming that the god appeared again, too busy fighting to maintain the delicate spell that had hidden him. He created a few doubles as they exchanged blows, but she had terribly good hearing, following the sounds of Loki’s footsteps and always identifying the real opponent after a few motions.

Loki retreated, drawing her off to the side, and the heroes saw their chance and ran forward. Peter started on the door, giving it a solid kick and realizing as he met rattling resistance that this strategy was going to take a minute.

Things got worse fast, as a patrolling guard appeared around the corner and took in the scene, then immediately bolted to inform Killian instead of remaining to fight. “Um, problem!” Tony called to Loki, pointing at the retreating guard.

But Loki was having trouble with the guard he was fighting, tricks and illusions only taking him so far against military combat skill and relative invulnerability and fire.

Tony tried Peter. “Spidey, you’ve got super-powers, right?”

“Yeah. I’m _using_ them,” Peter said pointedly, kicking the door again.

It wasn’t long before Killian returned with eight guards and a sour look on his face.

Loki finally snuck up behind the woman he was fighting and landed a solid blow, pulling on her shoulder for leverage to punch a fist solidly through her chest. When Loki extracted his heat-blackened hand, his opponent fell limply to the ground.

Leaving them with only nine opponents to go.

“Burn the god if you _can,_ ” Killian advised his underlings calmly, “but whatever you do, don’t let the prisoners escape.”

Peter kicked again and the lock broke, doors slamming open, offering the two prisoners an easy escape.

Killian’s calm disappeared and his face contorted as he scowled at Loki. “Changed my mind. _Burn the god._ Don’t ever interfere with my plans again, you _lunatic!_ ”

“Then don’t take his stuff!” Tony advised, having no idea what he was talking about.

Loki settled into a fighting stance, facing the Extremis subjects. “Tony, Peter, _run._ ”

The two ran.

They cleared out of the neighborhood without incident and without a sign of anyone following them, and after a few blocks Tony slowed, coming to stop as he was struck by an odd thought. “Did he just call me _Tony?_ ”

“Yeah. Yeah, he did. Can we hurry? I’d like to avoid as much as possible being seen in this costume without my mask…”

“What kind of supervillain calls me _Tony?_ ”

“The crazy kind. Do you think he’s okay?”

A new voice said, “Probably not,” and the man behind the voice stepped in front of them, wisps of orange shifting under his skin.

Realising they were about to be attacked again, Peter stepped in front of Tony and said, “Mr. Stark, run.”

Tony stayed where he was.

Eyeing them carefully for sudden moves, the Extremis subject pulled out a cellphone and dialed. “Hey boss, I found th-”

And then the guy’s head was being sliced free of his neck, and Loki materialized behind him, shoving the decapitated body aside. He was covered from head to toe in nasty burn marks and looked very much winded, but after a deep breath and a magical gesture, Loki returned to his customary appearance, clean-cut and unsinged.

“Killian?” Tony asked without preamble while Peter stared down at the dead body.

“He got away, along with most of his followers.”

“Damn,” Tony swore. “Did you take back whatever he took?”

Loki glanced at him -- just blinked and looked him up and down, oddly unguarded. “Not precisely.”

“Then I guess you’re probably not done with Killian yet. Come back to my place for a drink. Wait, no, not a drink, bad idea. Whatever. We’ll plan the next move.”

Loki shook his head. “You and I weren’t meant to be allies, Stark. It’s not how the game is played.”

“C’mon, since when do you follow the rules?”

Loki’s gaze flicked between Tony and Spider-Man again, and his mouth curled in the ghost of a grimace. “I wish you both luck,” he said with finality, and disappeared into thin air.

“Hey, thanks for saving us!” Peter called into empty air, belatedly remembering his manners.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am terribly mean :)
> 
> ~Rose


	3. What’s Happening Frequently

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When telling people news that makes them question your sanity or theirs becomes a familiar sensation, your life has become very strange indeed.

A week later Peter’s cell phone rang while he was walking home from school and the caller ID read “Iron Man.” Peter did not have a contact with that label, which was actually pretty good evidence that the caller was exactly who he claimed.

Peter picked up, and Tony started talking without waiting for a greeting. “So, as it turns out, it was not hard to check back over the security footage and figure out your secret identity. Ha.”

“I have no idea who you are or what you’re talking about. Did you figure out how to patch the Extremis thing?”

“It is like ninety-nine percent done. I could just use a little bit of, y’know, _assistance_ with… all of it.”

Peter bent over laughing, and finally finished with a derisively articulated, “ _Ha._ ”

“Hey, I’m not a soft science guy!”

“Bio-chem and genetic engineering are _not_ soft sciences.”

“Okay, well, I’m inviting you over to my house to do science. Plan to get here yesterday.”

“Naw, I have a date,” Peter declined. “I’ll swing by tonight, though.”

“Is a _date_ more important to you than saving the world from fiery exploding people?”

“It’s with Gwen Stacy.”

“That blond intern?”

“Yup,” Peter confirmed.

“Fair point. See you tonight.”

 

.:.

That night, Peter found himself once again in the land of marvels that was Stark Tower. For a while Peter just gawped, awed and a little lost.

A scientist approached him and shook his hand. “Hi. Bruce Banner. You’re Spider-Man, right?”

Peter started a little and looked around to see if anyone had heard. “Geez, did he tell everyone?”

“Basically. But, um, no one who will tell anyone else. You should be fine.”

“Where is he?”

“Sixth R&D floor. Ask Jarvis if you get lost. The AI, he runs the place.”

“Jarvis?” Peter called experimentally.

“At your service, Mr. Parker. There is an available elevator to your left.”

“Thanks,” Peter said to Dr. Banner, then he made his way to the elevator.

Once Peter left the elevator, Jarvis directed him to a set of doors and he stepped through them into the lab. “Mr. Stark?”

Sitting at a midair display in deep concentration, Tony started little when he realized someone had spoken, the waved Peter further into the room. “Finally! Get in here, sticky tack. I’ve got the Extremis codes pulled up here. Take a look and tell me if you think this can be cured.”

Peter put down his backpack and sat next to Tony. He spent several long minutes examining the screen before he answered. “It’s a global genetic change, which would normally be impossible to reverse, but we can use the same mechanism from the original Extremis activation procedure. There’s a much more streamlined version in the booster serum, but we’ll need the whole shebang if we want to get the Extremis code cleanly out of every cell. That could be a problem. It’ll be pretty obvious to anyone looking at it that it’s something outside of the norm for an improved booster serum.”

“Unless,” said Tony, “I can compress it down far enough to slip into some part of the program that no one will look at anymore. Right in the middle of the UI codes, somewhere like that.”

Peter thought it through and then shrugged. “It’ll move slower, but yeah, if you can really compress it that far.”

“Can and will.”

So Tony watched and made the occasional suggestion while Peter put together a draft of the coding for the reversal. Then Tony took over and set a lifetime of knowledge and shortcuts on the document, cutting it to a fraction of its size. Peter mostly stared in wonder and catalogued techniques for later reference, but occasionally Tony cut something that couldn’t be cut, not quite realizing the function of a phrase, and Peter would interrupt with a “Whoa, whoa, not like that!”

Then they set Jarvis to work, putting together a virus to alter Killian’s computers with the same serum design if they ever got access to his network again.

“That’s all we can do until we track down Killian and his goons.” Tony closed the program and swiveled thoughtfully around on his chair. “So, one thing I’m not clear on. You really snuck into my tower because you wanted an _internship_? ‘Cause you know, there’s an application process…”

Peter shook his head. “It wasn’t really about the internship. I was looking for my mom.”

“...Because long-lost parents just sort of gather at the nearest skyscrapers and wait for their estranged children to find them there.” Tony nodded. “Makes sense.”

“Because Stark Industries was the only clue I could find. My mom left me with my aunt and uncle when I was seven. I don’t know why, just that she was scared of something.”

“Here comes the sob story...” Tony sighed uninterestedly, picking up a metal joint from his desk and playing with it.

“Look, I _really_ need to know if you can find her. I was looking through her stuff a few weeks ago, and I found this Stark Industries business card with a number written on the back -- ”

Tony dropped the metal part with a loud _clang_ and spun to face him. “What was the number?”

Peter blinked. Well, that obviously meant something to Tony. “Why?”

“It’s nothing,” said Tony. “Definitely nothing. Probably. Just -- just tell me the number.”

“Um, I don’t remember. I don’t have it with me…”

“310-555-5654?”

“That might have been it. Right area code, and it had a lot of fives.” Peter reached into his pocket. “Look, I have a picture of her on my phone.”

“Show me,” Tony commanded.

Peter pulled up the picture and handed over the phone.

Tony stared at the screen like it was a lifeline, or maybe a death sentence. “Rebecca?” he whispered.

“Um… my mom’s name was _Runa._ Runa Parker?”

“She must have changed it,” Tony said quietly, still staring hard at the photograph. “When I knew her she was Rebecca Porcher.”

“You’re sure you knew her?”

“Jarvis,” Tony called absently.

A holographic display appeared in front of Peter, with a picture of his mother that he had never seen before. She was dressed in a glittering green blouse and a black skirt, grinning in delight, while a young Tony Stark wrapped his arms around her and amorously kissed her cheek. “Oh wow. You really knew my mom,” Peter said flatly, unnerved.

Jarvis’s voice started up. “Rebecca Porcher was in a relationship with Mr. Stark October of 1997 through February of 1998. There is no known record of her existence after that February.”

“So, you really can’t find her?” Peter concluded, disappointment mingling with a weird, buzzing excitement he hadn’t quite made sense of yet.

Tony’s eyes were still trained on the picture, but he shook his head. “Been trying for eighteen years.”

“Wow. Okay.” Peter furrowed his brow. Then it clicked. “Wait. This was _actually_ 1998?”

“Correct,” the AI confirmed.

“That’s the year I was b….”

Tony finally looked up from the photograph to stare at Peter, wide-eyed.

“...born.”

Tony’s hand shot up and clutched at his desk as if he was suddenly unsure his chair would hold him up. “What month?”

“August.” The timing lined up exactly.

Tony seemed to be having trouble breathing. “Okay. Let’s not panic. It’s _possible_ she was just cheating on me.”

Peter cocked his head and squinted at Tony incredulously. “And that’s so much _better_ than me being your son?”

Tony stared at him blankly for a second, said, “Yikes,” stood, and left the room.

“I’ll take that as a yess...” Peter muttered as he got up and started strolling the workshop, staring at interesting gadgets and inventions contemplatively as he passed.

A few minutes later Tony appeared again, and held a finger up eloquently. “Okay, I have something to say. There is a _reason_ I never wanted a kid.”

 _Burn,_ Peter thought, forcibly extinguishing the little bit of hope that had started up when he saw the way Tony looked at his mom’s photograph.

“My dad? He didn’t do the _dad_ thing, okay? He was cold, he was distant, and all he ever wanted from me was to get out of his hair. I wasn’t gonna do that to someone. I’m just not the fathering type, you know? Ask my robots; they’ve taken more verbal abuse than the cameras on the set of ‘Jerry Springer.’ But if I _did_ have a kid, I always figured I’d do a _little_ better than he did. Maybe actually _be_ there occasionally, and not ship the kid off to boarding school first chance I got. So finding out that I missed my shot? Finding out you grew up, and I _wasn’t there,_ that I made all the same mistakes because I didn’t get a fucking say in the matter? Yeah, I’m pissed off. Yeah, I’d rather find out that your mom cheated than that she _took you away from me._ So sue me.”

Peter realized that he was gaping. “So. So you really care. I mean, if I’m...”

“ _Yeah._ ”

Peter paced and fidgeted, not sure what to do with that. They still didn’t know for sure. “So, um, should we, um, get a paternity test then?”

Tony smiled a little. “And put an end to all this mystery and angst? God forbid. Jarvis, get Bruce up here to take some samples.”

“Yes sir. Though I can inform you now that given the similarities I’ve just cross-referenced in your facial structure, the probability that you two are _not_ blood related is almost negligible.”

Tony and Peter looked at each other for several long seconds as that sunk in.

“Hi Dad,” Peter said, just to hear how it sounded. Then he stuck out his tongue in disgust. “No, that’s -- that's too weird. Can I just call you Tony?”

“Please,” Tony begged, relieved.

Awkward silence.

Then Peter thought of something. “I should warn you, my DNA isn’t exactly normal.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Yeah, the spider thing. I’m familiar.”

“No, actually, besides that. It’s… Well, if you knew my mom really well, then I guess you know already,” Peter realized.

Tony frowned. “...Know what?”

Peter’s eyes widened and he took a step back. “Oh. You _don’t._ ”

“Don’t _what_?”

“You don’t know. Okay, this just got a whole new level of weird.”

“Peter, shut up and tell me what’s going on.”

Peter hesitated. He could totally make something up right now. His mother had taught him well; he was good at lying to keep an important secret. But he didn’t want to. Telling Tony the truth felt right. And if his mom wanted him to keep lying for her, then she could damn well show up and tell him that. After a beat, Peter admitted, “Well, my mom wasn’t human.”

Tony froze for a few seconds, then walked out of the room again. Apparently that was his way of dealing with everything.

Doctor Banner appeared while Tony was gone, and Peter waved a hand to greet him. “Hi.”

“Hi. Tony wanted me to take some samples?”

“Um, yeah. DNA swabs. You can start with me.”

Bruce nodded and started assembling the equipment. “What’s this for?”

“Paternity test.”

Bruce froze for a moment then got back to work. “Wow. That’s… something. You and Tony?”

“Yeah. It’s actually, like, pretty much for sure. This is just to double-check, you know?”

Tony walked in again then. “Oh. Bruce. You’re here. Good.”

Bruce offered Tony a smile. “I understand congratulations are in order?” To Peter he said, “Open your mouth.”

Tony looked up at the ceiling contemplatively. “Is that what you say? Yeah, that makes sense. Thanks. Yeah, it is actually pretty cool. I have a kid that’s half human, half spider, half… what are you?” he finished, directing the question at Peter.

Peter waited for Bruce to withdraw the swab, then said, “Mom always told me she was Jotun by blood and Asgardian by form, and that I seemed to favor the Asgardian. I don’t know enough about alien genetics to have any idea what that means, but I’d love to get a good look at my DNA. And, if you two could _not_ tell anyone else about this, I’d appreciate it.”

“Alien,” Tony echoed. “She was an alien. From outer space. Well, this keeps getting better and better. I don’t s’pose she was also secretly a man?”

Peter opened his mouth to reassure Tony, recalled some relevant, long-forgotten childhood memories, and closed his mouth again without speaking.

“ _No,_ ” Tony said when he realized what Peter’s silence meant. “No. No way. Nope. I’m out. I am going to wake up now, and swear off whatever food or drink has _caused me to have this dream_.”

“I don’t know!” Peter said defensively. “She was a shapeshifter! She was _usually_ a woman, but… just not _every_ day.”

Bruce dropped Peter’s swab into a plastic tube.  “Mr. Parker, I think you just broke the _weirdest childhood_ record for superheroes listed by SHIELD. That’s really, really impressive.”

Peter shrugged. “She was great. Until she left. I mean, that was the only part _I_ really thought was weird. The fact that she didn’t come back.”

Bruce offered Peter an apologetic grimace. “Fair enough.”

“And like I said, she was a woman most of the time. I don’t even remember what she looked like as a man. I mean, I was really young, and all the pictures I kept were of, y’know, _mom_.”

“Okay.” Tony nodded. “That’s comforting. Yeah. I mean, not that she wouldn’t have been sexy as hell as a man, it’s just all a little --”

“Tony!” Peter shouted, clapping his hands over his ears. “Please do not ever describe my mom to me as _sexy as hell._ That’s not okay!”

“You just told me my ex-girlfriend was a sometimes-male extraterrestrial. I think we’re pretty far past _not okay._ ”

Bruce walked up to Tony with the next swab. “If Peter was never human, that does explain how he survived being bitten by the spiders.”

“How do you know I was…” But then Peter understood. “Oh. Security footage, right?”

“...And it kind of followed,” Tony added, sitting down in his office chair and opening his mouth for Bruce to swab. “Play doctor with me, Bruce.”

“So, Peter, where have you been living?” Bruce inquired while he swabbed Tony’s cheek.

He finished quickly, and Tony added. “Yeah, you mentioned an aunt and an uncle. Somehow I don’t think Becky would have left you with the people she’s _actually_ related to.”

“Yeah, _no_ ,” Peter agreed, remembering some of those stories. “Just some friends my mom met when she was pregnant with me. They’re family, though, in the way that matters. Right now I live with my aunt May down in Forest Hills. For now. We’re kinda about to lose the house…” Peter admitted, because it was true, and also because it was manipulative.

“No you’re not,” said Tony immediately. “Not unless you want a bigger house. Or ten bigger houses.”

Peter turned to Bruce. “Does he, like, show affection by throwing money at people?”

“Usually. You can tell when he’s really trying because the gifts get cheaper. And... stupider.”

Peter nodded. “I’ll keep that in mind. I’ll also make up an Amazon wish list.”

Tony shifted in his chair. “I could… buy you… Amazon,” he suggested haltingly, clearly very unsure how the offer would be taken.

“I think I’ll leave you to your family bonding,” Bruce said after a pause, gesturing between the two with his glasses as he made his exit with the samples in hand.

In reply to Tony’s offer, Peter held up his hands. “Um… no thanks. I’m good.”

“Creepy?”

“ _So_ creepy,” Peter confirmed.

“Got it.” Tony tapped a short drum solo on his desk and changed the subject. “So. Um. You - you like science?”

“Um… yeah!”

“Which kinds? Aside from...”

“Mostly physics, microbiology, chemistry, materials engineering...”

“Materials engineering?” Tony brightened up.

“Yeah. I designed the webbing I use. You know,” he absently threw out a web to a nearby office chair and tugged so it rolled precisely under him as he sat, “That stuff. It’s based on the material your company engineered out of those mutant spiders, but I made a lot of changes...”

They talked shop for a while, and it was a relief for both of them to move back to common ground where they were both knowledgeable. The conversation branched out into a discussion of the disadvantages of palladium in arc reactor design. Peter was well out of his depth, but _no one_ knew how arc reactors worked, and hearing about them first hand from the man who built them was way too cool.

“I can’t believe you made one small enough to fit in your chest. How deep does that go?”

“About three inches or so.”

Peter’s head rocked forward in shock and he raised his eyebrows. How was the guy still alive? “Speaking as the local biology expert, I’m pretty sure you’re supposed to have bones there. And, y’know, lungs.”

“Yeah,” Tony cleared his throat, clearly uncomfortable. “I noticed.”

Peter grimaced. “Sorry.”

There was a knock at the door and Bruce returned. "Well, you two are a match; no doubt about that."

Peter glanced sideways and saw a small inadvertent smile curl onto Tony's face at the confirmation. Good sign, that.

Bruce went on. "Peter, your DNA is consistent with the transformations they were trying to achieve when they first engineered the spiders. Under that, you're three quarters human. I can't make heads or tails of the last quarter. It's been through more distortion than the rest, but I don't think it's Asgardian."

"I'm three quarters human?"

"You used to be, yeah."

Peter’s face took on a frown of deep confusion. "That must mean Mom was half human. She never told me that."

"Sounds like there's a lot she didn't tell us," Tony muttered

"But she always made a point of telling me _what I was._ She wanted me to understand. If she's part human and she didn't tell me, maybe she really didn't know. You know, I bet this is why I never got real super powers. Before."

The door opened and The Pepper Potts walked in. “Tony, you have that interview with Jack McGee in ten minutes, so whatever you’re in the middle of, it’s time to put it down and clean up.” With a glance at the other two men she said, “Sorry, but you two are going to have to clear out.”

Bruce walked out and Peter moved to follow him.

Then Pepper really looked at Peter. “Oh, hello. I don’t believe we’ve met. Pepper Potts.” She held out her hand.

Peter shook it. “Peter Parker.”

Pepper smiled, with maybe just a hint of suspicion. “It’s not every day I meet someone for the first time in Tony’s favorite lab. This would have to be a first, actually. He’s so picky about who he lets in here. Are you one of the new interns?”

Peter looked to Tony questioningly.

Tony shrugged. “If you want to be.”

“Yeah. Yeah, that sounds awesome. Can I work here with you?”

“You do make for a decent lab assistant.”

Peter grinned, and he saw Tony’s eyebrows tilt up with that strange sort of incandescent melancholy that he often saw on Aunt May. Translated loosely: _My little boy is so cute. If only he were really mine._ The expression looked pretty confused about being on Tony Stark’s face.

Pepper caught the look too before Tony cleared his throat and turned back to his work. She looked between to two engineers with more and more suspicion. “Mr. Parker, who _are_ you?”

Peter grimaced apologetically. “I’m Rebecca Porcher’s son.”

Pepper found a chair and sat hard.

“And Tony’s, it turns out,” he finished.

Pepper swiveled her chair a little to look at Tony. “I’m calling McGee and cancelling your interview.”

“Might be a good call,” Tony agreed.

“Tony…” Pepper started.

“Yeah?”

" _You had unprotected sex_?!"

Tony finally turned toward them again to defend himself. "I was drunk! ...I assume. And how is that your business, by the way?"

Pepper dug up her notebook and started taking down notes as she thought frantically. "I'm going to have to talk to legal and revise all the documents. We'll need to completely rework your will. Are there any other possible children I should know about?"

"I dunno. How many times have I been drunk?"

Pepper stared at him for a beat, and wordlessly wrote something else in her notebook.

“Oh come on Pepper, _I thought I was going to marry her._ I didn’t know this would happen, but it’s not like she was some random groupie. Although I guess I might have thought a little harder if I’d known she was from outer space.”

“Tony… _what_?”

“Okay, but there was really _no way_ I could have known that one.” Tony seemed to be letting himself panic a little more now that Pepper was around to… well, also panic.

“Um, Tony,” Peter cut in. “Y’know how I was trying to keep the extraterrestrial DNA a secret? With the not getting cut up in the name of science?”

“I tell Pepper everything,” Tony said obviously.

“Okay. Fine.” Peter turned to Pepper. “Full disclosure: I’m Spider-Man. There. Now everyone knows.”

“No one who will tell anyone else,” said Tony.

Peter nodded and sighed. “Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.”

Pepper said, “Tony, if this is some sort of practical joke, you _want to tell me right now._ ”

“It’s not. It really really should be. I mean this would be a great one. But it’s not.”

“Okay,” Pepper said, gathering herself again after a long series of shocks. “Okay. We just need to all sit down, and talk through the implications of this.”

Peter’s eyes widened as a thought struck him and he scrambled for his phone. “Geez, what time is -- _shit._ Sorry, uh, excuse me but it’s late. I’ve got to get home. Um, good talk.” He scrambled to gather his things.

“Peter,” Pepper said, calmer now. “Can you come by tomorrow after school? There’s a lot to talk about, and some paperwork I’ll have ready for you by then.”

“Sure -- yeah. I’ll see you then.” He stood and headed for the door. “Bye Tony.”

Tony waved goodbye, but something in his eyes said, _Don’t leave me alone with this woman._ Peter smiled and left anyway.

 

.:.

He sighed as he finally made it through the door to his own home and felt a tiredness flood his body that had been waiting for familiar surroundings to make itself felt. His guardian was waiting for him, worried and verging on cross.

“Hi, Aunt May.”

She kissed his cheek. “Peter, you’re home so late.” She took in his face, and evidently decided against scolding him. “Is something wrong?”

“No.” He shook his head emphatically and grinned so widely his eyes closed. “No, nothing’s wrong. Something’s actually right, but, um, can we talk?”

“Of course. Sit down. What happened?”

They both sat at the kitchen table, and Peter cut to the chase. “I… I met my birth father today.”

Slackjawed, Aunt May shook her head. “I didn’t even know you were looking for him.”

“I wasn’t. It just happened. I was at Stark Tower...”

“What were you doing at Stark Tower?”

“It’s a long story. But I was talking to Tony Stark...”

“You met _Tony Stark_ today?”

“I actually met him last week. I just didn’t know at the time that he was my dad.” He waited a minute for the news to sink in. Aunt May gaped and put a hand to her mouth in abject amazement, and Peter grinned again, satisfied with her reaction. “So, today I showed him that picture of my mom. You know that one I took when I was a kid? And he recognized her! I think, I mean, the way he was looking at the picture, I think she was the one that got away or something.”

“And you’re sure? That you’re his son, that there’s not some mistake?”

“Apparently you can get a DNA test done _really_ fast if you’re Tony Stark. We’re sure. I mean, Uncle Ben was my dad. He raised me; you can’t trump that. But Aunt May,” Peter reached forward and took both her hands in his, grinning again. “We’re not gonna have to worry about money anymore. Not ever.”

“And he’s alright with this?”

“Yeah, he’s…. He’s sort of got that prickly-on-the-outside, cares-a-lot-on-the-inside thing going on? Anyway, he looked happy when the test results came back. And he offered me a bunch of money, like he doesn’t even…” Peter trailed off when May’s expression stayed mixed, joy and caution both.

Aunt May took a breath and laid a hand over Peter’s on the table. “I just want you to consider the possibility that your mother may have had a reason for keeping you out of that world.”

“What reason?”

“Why did she keep you a secret from him all these years?”

“I don’t know! My mom kept a lot of secrets. What are you worried about?”

“People like Tony Stark… I’m just not sure if you can trust him, Peter. He comes from a very different life, and you’re so young…”

“What, are you scared I’m going to start going on drinking binges or…?” Then, reading his aunt’s expression, Peter realized he was on the right track. “Oh.”

“Or risking your life in reckless ways, or letting your place in the world change how you see people, how you treat people. How you expect people to treat you.”

Peter remembered how he had acted when he first got the hang of his superpowers. The high of mocking revenge, and how far down the crash had taken him. “But you have to know that I know better than that now.”

“Peter, where do you go when you stay out this late? _Other_ nights. When you come home with bruises?”

“I guess that does look bad.”

“Can’t you just _tell_ me?”

Sooner or later, he might have to. “I’m going to bed.”

Once he had retreated to his bedroom, Peter dug out his phone and took a long look at the photograph of his mother that he had showed Tony earlier. “Why _did_ you keep me from him, Mom?”

 

.:.

“So how’d it go with Mr. Stark?” was Gwen’s first question to him when they met up for lunch.

“Good. Good. It was, um… okay, a lot of big stuff happened.”

“Did you catch Killian?”

“No, nothing like that, just, um. Apparently he’s my dad.”

“Killian is?”

“ _No,_ ” Peter denied on a laugh. “No,” he added more firmly. “Tony Stark is.”

Gwen was quiet for a while. “You’re Tony Stark’s son.”

“Turns out.”

“First you’re Spider-Man, and now you’re Tony Stark’s son.”

“Yup.”

She nodded, and her eyes narrowed. “Anything else I should know about? Chosen one destined to defeat the dark lord of some-such? Heir to the throne of a magical ice kingdom?”

“Not that I know of? I told you about being part alien.”

“You did.”

“Then your guess is as good as mine about exactly who I am. I still don’t know what’s up with my mom. She was calling herself Rebecca Porcher when she met Tony.”

“So how did he take it? How did he even find out?”

“Showed him a picture of my mom. He took it… well. I mean, he was kind of shocked, but he’s been acting… dad-ish? Or. I mean. Like he wants to try. He must have liked me a lot anyway to let me into his lab if what Miss Potts said is true.”

“Wow. Wow. Wait, so are you going to take me to meet your dad?”

“Haven’t you met him?”

A slightly vengeful glint came into Gwen’s eyes. “As a lackey. Not as his son’s girlfriend.”

Conspiratorial looked lovely on her, and Peter couldn’t help grinning. “You know, I have a feeling you meeting my parents is going to be just as awful for them as meeting _your_ parents was for _me_.”

“I thought you didn’t know where your mom was.”

“I don’t. But you’ll meet her. Someday.”

She smiled at that and leaned into his shoulder.

 

.:.

“I have a question for you that I want you to think about very carefully,” Pepper started when Peter met with her the next day. “Would you like us to inform the press that you’re Tony’s son?”

Peter shifted in the chair opposite her desk. “Is Tony okay with that?”

“He is. Now the main advantage of that is that we can control how the story comes out. Someone could find out and inform the press without warning. That’s not a fun road. You end up having to do a lot of press work in a rush, and there will be accusations that we’re keeping other secrets. Which, of course, we are. Telling the press also allows you to accept gifts of monetary value from Tony without it looking suspicious.”

“Seems like that won’t be too hard to explain. Wealthy relative died and left me money or something.”

“True. It depends a lot on your ability to lie consistently. Now, the disadvantages… Well, the main one is that you can’t take it back. You’ll be in the public eye all the time. You’ll have to deal with paparazzi and frequent requests for money from friends and family. It may be almost impossible for you to maintain your alter-ego. We’ll need to get you press trained either way just in case. I know it may seem frivolous, but trust me: the internet is very cruel to the ineptly famous.”

“It’s been pretty nice to Spider-Man so far.”

Pepper sighed and leaned forward, catching his eyes with a look that was kind but also determined to communicate a point. “Fame is a high, Peter. It’s more intense than anyone is ever really ready for, and it _always_ crashes. There’s a reason so many public figures have addiction problems, and it’s not just cultural. People are going value you, respect you, and adore you _because_ you have money and connections, and because you become a familiar presence in their lives. And their opinion of you can fluctuate pretty wildly with the latest rumor or scandal. You’ll be fighting the current trying to keep track of your own identity in the middle of it all. I imagine you've already experienced that a little as Spider-Man."

"But it's kind of different. That's an alter-ego."

"What I want you to remember is that no matter how much they they start to know about you, the person the public sees is always an alter-ego. Peter Stark will just be a more complex one. He’s real, the way Spider-Man is real, but you’ll always be wearing a sort of mask. Your reputation is something you _have._ It isn’t who you are."

Peter nodded thoughtfully. “So what if we just admit that Spider-Man is Tony’s son?”

Pepper titled her head, frowning polite curiosity. “How do you imagine that working?”

“Well, Spider-Man’s already pretty much a public figure. We can be totally honest about the fact that we’re not telling them who I am. People will try to figure it out, but no one’s figured out who Spider-Man is _yet_. And then when the press _does_ find out, it’s no big surprise, because everyone already knew that Tony Stark had a superhero son with a secret identity.” Peter paused. “Wow, my life is cool. Anyway, after that it’s just ‘oh, hey, he’s a normal-looking guy. That’s exactly what we expected.’ It’ll make headlines for a while but it won’t rock anyone’s world. And in the meantime I can try to have a sort of normal life sometimes.”

Pepper frowned thoughtfully. “One issue with that is that it creates a vulnerability. Two superheroes who can be used against each other is gold in the supervillain world. But that could be a problem down the road with any option. It’s a good idea.”

Pepper jotted down more notes and turned a page in her notebook. “Here’s another question: Do you have any interest in one day taking over Stark Industries? You don’t have to be sure right now, but it’s something to think about. We made revisions to Tony’s will yesterday, and you stand to inherit the controlling interest. If you did become CEO, you would be more than just a figurehead.”

“Oh. Wow. Um. I dunno. Maybe? I guess I can see being good at it, but… I mean, I’m already a superhero. And there’s some other stuff I want to do too.”

“It’s a lot of responsibility.”

“Yeah. Okay, I have a question. And don’t take this the wrong way, but… you guys just met me. And now you’re setting me up to get all this stuff in Tony’s will? How do you know I won’t, like, murder him? I mean, I _wouldn’t,_ ” Peter laughed awkwardly, “... _obviously_. But...”

“No, it’s a valid question. You wouldn’t be the first of Tony’s close friends to try.”

“To _murder_ him? Wait, seriously?”

“Tony and Obadiah Stane were close, until Obadiah hired a militia in Afghanistan to have him killed. That’s privileged information by the way.”

Peter nodded.

“It’s not something I haven’t considered, and the will _is_ set up so that I can veto your inheritance if Tony’s death can be clearly traced back to you.”

Peter frowned. “Who does it go to then?”

“The stocks get sold on the open market, and all proceeds go to a charity, to be randomly selected from a pool of over five hundred organizations. No one stands to profit directly from framing you, if that’s what you’re concerned about.”

“Unless they want to buy a controlling interest at market value.”

It was Pepper’s turn to frown. “Fair point. I’ll work on that.” She wrote something on her notepad. “Anyway, Peter, we don’t think you’re out to kill anyone. Well, not out to kill _Tony_ , anyway,” she amended, apparently remembering the narrow focus of Spider-Man’s earlier exploits. “You’re not the type, and I don’t think you stand to gain anything by it that you actually _want_. If something happens and you’re implicated, I’m not about to jump to the conclusion that it was you.”

“Thanks. This is… complicated, isn’t it?”

She smiled sympathetically at him. “ _Very_. Welcome to Tony Stark’s life.”

 

.:.

After the meeting with Pepper, Jarvis directed Peter up to Tony’s lab to start his duties as a lab assistant.

Tony was half-buried in a suit when Peter arrived and he transitioned pretty smoothly from ordering Jarvis around to ordering Peter around. And Peter couldn’t begrudge Tony his focus. He was watching a suit of armor for the modern age come together, and it was pretty darn magnificent. So he happily fetched whatever needed to be fetched and held still whatever needed to be held still and let himself bask in the wonder of it all.

Eventually, though, Jarvis started to express concern about Tony not having eaten breakfast yet, it being three in the afternoon and all. So Peter joined forces with the AI in dragging Tony away from his chores long enough to agree that yes, sandwiches. And once he was little out of his zone, Tony took more of an interest in his lab assistant as they worked, asking about his hobbies and getting the teenager to blather on for a bit about photography and the equipment involved.

Eventually Peter got up the courage to ask, “So I was wondering if you and me and Gwen could get together sometime. Like maybe we could come over for lunch?”

Tony stilled and stared at him with justified suspicion. “...Why?”

Peter shrugged. “Well, she’s my girlfriend. It’s sort of a tradition in our culture for girlfriends and parents to meet. It’s a way of saying that I’m serious about her,” he embellished.

Tony stared for a few more seconds, then returned abruptly to cheer and motion as if nothing had happened. “Absolutely. Jarvis will tell Pepper to set something up. Have you seen the connectors for the acromial joint?”

“Um, I don’t think they’re here.”

Tony searched around a bit, then finally emptied his pockets onto a clear space of counter and tracked down the parts from the various odds and ends. After a few more minutes of silent work, Tony pause and spoke as if against his better judgement. “You don’t have… someone better?”

“Huh?”

“To introduce Gwen to. I mean, it’s an honor. I just figured after seventeen years…”

“...That someone else would get that honor?” Peter finished for him, and his stomach knotted.

“Sure.”

“Well, she did meet Uncle Ben once before he died.”

Tony nodded and they lapsed into quiet again, a little less comfortable this time.

Eventually the inventor spoke again. “Pepper said something about Spider-Man’s history.”

“Yeah?”

“That the first twenty-odd criminals he caught all fit a specific physical description.”

Peter pushed himself up to sit on one of the counters and shrugged, hunching forward to rest his elbows on his knees. “Yeah.”

Tony didn’t say a word, just watched himself screw in the connectors to the shoulder joints.

“Ben raised me for most of my life. He was… he was a good dad.” Peter realized he was tearing up and swore. “He was shot about a month ago. The guy who did it...”

“...matched that description.”

Peter nodded, fast like he could shake all the feelings out of his skull. “Yeah.”

Tony was staring at him intently, and he spoke with perfect, scary certainty. “We’ll find him. And we’ll kill him.”

It was very twisted, the certainty there, but it was exactly what Peter needed to hear. He nodded again and realized that he really was going to cry. Which was dumb because Tony might be his father but Peter barely knew the guy, and you didn’t just burst into tears in front of someone you’d only known for a week.

He looked down and waited for Tony to feel awkward and leave the room again, because that seemed to be how he dealt with emotions. Peter heard footsteps confirming his theory, but then they approached instead of leaving, and Tony came to stand in front of him.

Peter leaned forward enough to rest the top of his head against Tony's shoulder, and just held that pose for a minute. Tony cleared his throat. “Weird?” the older man inquired.

Peter wordlessly shook his head no.

“It's okay, right?” Tony's hands came up to rest comfortingly at the top of his neck, cradling Peter's head against his shoulder. “It's okay.”

And that felt so much like his mother, the way she had held his head when she kissed him goodbye all those years ago, and Peter started sobbing, a quiet, choked sound. He watched tears trail down his nose and drip onto the floor, as gravity overcame surface tension and Tony's hands brushed through his hair over and over again, steady and consoling.

After a while Peter felt something nudge his shoulder. Tony’s hands fell away as Peter turned his head to see what it was. Then Peter laughed, because one of Tony’s manufacturing robots was holding out a tissue.

“Not now, Butterfingers,” Tony rebuked.

“No, it’s okay,” Peter said, smiling wetly at the robot. He took the tissue and wiped his nose with it. “Hi there. What’s your name? Butterfingers?”

Butterfingers cooed affectionately at Peter in a way that reminded him a lot of R2D2.

Peter held up the used tissue. “Any chance you could get me a whole box of these?”

Butterfingers perked up excitedly and spun to head toward the tissue box across the room. True to its name, the robot dropped the box several times on the way back toward Peter, and ultimately handed him a crumpled mess of cardboard, just barely intact enough to keep dispensing tissue.

“Thanks,” Peter said, and started in on the task of removing large quantities of snot from the inside of his head.

Tony had apparently recalled his squeamishness (regarding either emotions or phlegm; it was hard to tell). He backed away until he was once again seated at his desk halfway across the room.

DUM-E rolled over with a rag and started cleaning the spot on the floor where most of Peter’s tears had ended up.

“You know what always cheers me up?”

Peter made a “Mm?” noise of question as he shook his head no.

“Injecting various insects with Extremis to see how many blow up.”

“You’ve never _done_ that,” Peter pointed out.

“Which is how I know it hasn’t failed yet in cheering me up. Common, I want to see if you can get these overload rates under twenty percent.”

Insects and unpredictable fiery explosions and algorithm refinement did turn out to be a distracting combination until Pepper walked in just as a particularly spectacular detonation cracked through the room.

Tony and Peter grinned at each other until they noticed Pepper standing at the door with her arms crossed, at which point Peter had the decency to look contrite.

“Tony, these are _not_ safe experiments for a child to be conducting.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “He’s more durable than I am. Super-powers, remember?”

“But you’re the adult, here, Tony. It’s your job to -”

“He's fine, he's _eighteen_. He can look after himself.”

“Seventeen,” Peter corrected.

“Seventeen,” Tony echoed. “See? He's already more responsible than me; he just admitted he's a minor!”

“Tony, we need to talk,” Pepper said sternly, and walked away, clearly intending that Tony follow.

Tony winced and rose to follow her. “Back in a mo’. I _hope..._ ”

Peter waited about thirty seconds before following after them, stealthily keeping out of sight as he followed the sound of Pepper’s voice until it was in hearing distance.

She was lecturing Tony, of course. “...setting boundaries! And being a good example --”

“Okay, but he just _lost_ the dad that was all those things!” Tony cut in. “And if I try to be everything this Ben guy was, I’m just gonna piss the kid off.” Tony took a breath. “Pepper, I appreciate what you’re trying to do, but I don’t think becoming something I’m not is going to help me here. I’m his _family,_ okay? And I love the kid, I actually _really_ do. But I am _not his parent._ I don’t get to boss him around, and he wouldn’t listen if I tried. I haven’t earned that!”

A pause, then Pepper said, “You’re right.”

Consternation. “I _am_?”

“Enjoy the moment while you can, Tony,” Pepper said dryly, and the sound of her heels tapped into the distance.

Peter snuck back to his seat and was casually waiting by the time Tony got back. Tony sat down, looked at Peter, and said, “You know Jarvis watches the security feed in my vicinity right?”

Peter tilted up the corners of his mouth in a guilty wince. “Right. So, yeah. I heard what you said back there. And, about that. Um...” Peter ducked his head. “...Thanks.”

“No problem.”

Peter felt like he should say, _I love you too,_ or something to that effect. But he wasn’t sure how true it would be. He liked Tony a lot. More than he ever realistically expected to like his birth father. And it was nice to have another person to talk to besides Gwen who really understood him when he got deep into math and science. There was a sense of warm camaraderie that would probably look like love, if he saw it from far enough away or let it sit there for long enough. But he wasn’t sure, so he kept quiet.

Tony went back to his work. He tinkered a little more and after a moment he said, “Hey, hand me my pocket knife.”

Peter walked over to the table and searched out what looked like a glorified swiss army knife with the Stark Industries logo. Among Tony’s pile of belongings was a small piece of paper with writing on it. “What’s this?”

Tony looked up, then spoke quickly. “Oh that’s nothing, that’s --”

Peter picked it up and looked at it.

“-- Okay,” Tony sighed, giving up.

The paper read,

     _It was a sincere Love, only kept illusory._

His mother’s handwriting again. “What is this?” Peter asked again.

“That… is the goodbye note your mom left, if you must know.”

“Wow, she was giving you some mixed messages there.”

“You noticed that too, huh?”

Peter looked at the note again and felt some of the blood drain from his head as he processed what he was seeing. “Tony?”

“What is it?”

“Do you know what this says?”

Tony looked confused. “...I’ve read it.”

Eyes glued to the paper, Peter sank into the chair next to Tony. “Okay, so my mom loved riddles. Anagrams, codes, that sort of thing.”

Tony nodded. “Didn’t know that, but it does sound like her. Why?” He snatched the note back and examined it. “Is it an anagram?”

Peter shook his head. “No, not exactly. Just look at the first letter of each word.”

Tony read out the letters. “I, W, A, S, L, O, K, I. What does that… Aw, _hell_.”

“He did look familiar,” Peter mused, leaning back in his chair as he processed the new development. “Hey Tony, what was Loki doing spring of 2006?”

Tony didn’t answer. He was too busy staring at the note in horror.

Banner knocked on the door and Peter waved him in. “Hey Dr. Banner, what was Loki doing in the spring of 2006?”

The doctor took a minute to turn his mind back to what briefings he’d heard about the god. “Running away from SHIELD. They traced him to New York around then and he gave them the runaround for a few years. He moved around a lot and caused mayhem for all involved. Why?”

“I think if Tony learns anything else about my mom, you’re gonna have to commit him to a psych ward.”

Tony was still staring at the note and muttering at it. “Of _course_ you capitalized your own name you smug, egotistic fucker...”

Bruce asked again. “Care to explain?”

Peter tried. “Um. Apparently Loki is my biological mother.”

Bruce stared at him for a beat, turned, and walked out of the room.

After a long silence, Peter checked the clock and decided it was probably a good time to go home. Maybe patrol the city a bit for crimes-in-progress on the way. “Tony, I’m gonna head out.” When he got no response, he added. “You gonna be okay, here?”

“Mm,” Tony said, without any intonation or motion to make Peter believe the inventor had actually heard him.

“Um, Jarvis, I want to talk to Miss Potts on the way out. Do you know where she is?”

 

.:.

Pepper met him on the seventeenth floor and stepped into the elevator to accompany him out. “You wanted to talk?”

“Yeah. Another crazy revelation. I’m okay, but I’m not so sure about Tony. You might want to check up on him after I go.”

“Your mother’s true identity? Bruce told me.”

Peter smiled to himself when he realized he was a little disappointed. He was getting used to delivering shocking news and seeing the reactions, and now he’d missed a shot at one. But still... “That’s good. You know.” He took a deep breath. “It makes sense to me. Loki. It makes sense with the mom I knew. But she didn’t tell Tony as much, I’m pretty sure, so he’s taking it harder.”

“Peter.” Pepper was scrutinizing him now. “Are you _sure_ that _you’re_ okay?”

“Fine.” Peter slumped back against the elevator wall. “I just hope I didn’t come in here and screw everything up for everyone. I mean, I gave Dr. Killian the formula, and now Tony’s finding out all this stuff and… you all just keep going out of your way for me. Maybe I shouldn’t have come here to start with.”

She shook her head. “Peter, you didn’t know Tony for the past eighteen years.”

“No,” Peter agreed, nonplussed.

“Well if you did, then you’d know how much he’s changed since he met you. I haven’t seen him this… _alive_ since Rebecca left. Trust me. You’re the best thing that’s happened to him in a long time. And.” She smiled wryly. “You would _not_ be the first person in the family to entrust your technology to the wrong hands. You’re taking responsibility for your own mess; that’s all anyone can do. Aldrich Killian should never have been hired here. If he hadn’t taken your formula, he might have one day taken the reactor design, and that would have been a much bigger problem.”

“Oh.”

“‘Oh’ is right. So don’t go assuming you’re a burden and disappearing into the sunset like your mother did. That’s the only thing you _could_ do to make us regret meeting you.”

Peter nodded. “Okay. Thanks. Yeah, I’ll keep that in mind.” He smiled as the elevator doors opened and he stepped out. “You’ll be seeing more of me.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies for posting a chapter on Valentines Day and then not including any romance.


	4. I end up Alone at Will

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not all revelations are promising, and not all reunions are pleasant.

“You wanted to know what was going on,” Peter started. “Why I’m out late sometimes and why I keep getting hurt.” He took a breath and looked down at his hands.

Aunt May sat across from him at the kitchen table, leaning in with rapt attention as she waited for Peter to continue. This was the latest in a long series of strange revelations to various people in his life, but he was really dreading this one. She wasn’t going to like it, him risking his life like this. Not after Ben.

In a way, part of him was going to miss having this a secret from her. Things in the house had been stifled and forced since Ben’s death, and the anonymity of a mask had been liberating, for all the problems it had caused them.

Finally he smiled a little sheepishly and spat it out. “I’m kind of a superhero?”

Aunt May didn’t move much to acknowledge it. Eyes wide with curiosity stayed wide as she absorbed the blow of revelation. “Spider-Man?” she guessed, in an even whisper that didn’t tell him much about her state of mind.

Peter frowned. “Did you know?”

“No. I suspected. I didn’t know.” She shook her head, finally breaking that motionless stare. “I didn’t _know_. How could I _know?_ ” she demanded, a little distraught under her aggravation. “How could I know when you wouldn’t _tell me_ anything? How could I know that you were jumping off buildings, going after criminals alone, _risking your life…_ How could I know what to do? How could I know where the bruises came from, or who was hurting you? _How could I know?_ ”

Peter looked down at the table and nodded steadily through the last of her words. “You couldn’t.”

The pain she was showing really was something for him to be ashamed of. If there was one thing that hurt people more readily than keeping secrets did, it was keeping secrets badly. And she’d been so worried. She didn’t deserve to have to worry like that.

But people didn’t always get what they deserved. “I’m going to keep doing it,” Peter said with an apologetic shrug. “I’m gonna keep being Spider-Man. And I’m sorry. For lying to you.” _For not lying better._ “For everything.”

May sighed and got up, walked around the table to him and pulled his head to her side in a weak, affectionate embrace. “The lies have to stop. But you can’t help being your father’s son.”

“It’s not because--”

“ _Either of them_.” She brushed his hair back a little. “Ben expected so much of you. He asked you to help people with all the ability you have, and so that’s the man you became.” In an annoyed tone, she added, “Maybe someday I’ll even forgive him for that.”

Peter felt himself tearing up, and _man,_ he hated how much crying he was doing these days. “I’m not sure I’m as good as you think I am, Aunt May.”

“I wish that was true. But if there’s one thing you are, Peter, it’s good.”

 

.:.

Gwen was dating a superhero. She knew that. She had read and fully understood the terms of service, etc., so she really couldn’t bring herself be all that surprised when she did, ultimately, get kidnapped by a supervillain.

Lack of surprise, however, did not automatically translate into lack of panic.

Panic started slow and creeping in her chest, when her walk home from school one Friday afternoon was interrupted by several men appearing out of an alley in front of her and another behind, moving to surround her.

She looked around for help, and the street was mostly empty, just two other pedestrians who stopped to watch, unsure what was happening or what to do about it.

One of the men circling her moved in to grab her arm. He left himself wide open and Gwen got in a good solid kick, which resulted in the man doubling over briefly to clutch his bruised stomach, before he took up glowing a bright orange through his shirt.

“Oh, damn,” Gwen muttered, recognizing Extremis as Peter had described it to her. “Oh, this is so not good.”

There was a call of, “Hey!” from down the street, and the onlooking couple was running toward her, clearly intending to help. Not good. They were no match for Killian’s goons.

“No, stop!” Gwen called back to them, holding up a hand for them to halt. “You can’t help. Run away and call the police.”

She realized a few seconds later that she should say something about who she was or who was kidnapping her, but by then the couple had already taken off in the opposite direction, and there was a hand over her mouth, and she had to breathe through her nose, struggling to get enough air to feed her panic now that it was taking the forefront. Panic, breathe, fight, lose. Panic.

Luckily, the men seemed to have no immediate interest in hurting her. She was tied up, gagged and blindfolded, deposited in the trunk of a car, and driven a short enough distance that she didn’t even have time to properly kick out the back headlight before the car stopped and the trunk opened again. She started making a ruckus then, struggling and screaming as loud as the simple cloth gag she wore would allow, hoping to attract enough attention that someone would call the police, giving Peter some lead by which to find her.

She kicked out, and someone dropped her and swore, and then her assailants picked her up again in a secure hold, and she heard the sound of a door opening. What little light made it through her blindfold disappeared as she was carried forward. She gave up shouting and waited while she felt a bruise start to form on her backside from being dropped on what had felt like pavement.

Eventually she felt the press of a wood chair under her and hands working at the ropes to tie her more securely in place. A new pair of hands removed the gag, and she didn’t bother to start shouting again.

When the blindfold came off in short order, the hands turned out to belong to a familiar face. “Doctor Killian,” Gwen identified aloud.

“Miss Stacy. Lovely to see you outside the office for a change.”

Killian looked different. He acted different too, holding himself up higher, still easy to smile, but now it was an unpleasant smile. Gwen felt sick, seeing him. It had somehow not bothered her to hear Peter talk about her old boss as an enemy in the abstract, but now she remembered that she had _liked_ the man Killian had recently been. The friendly, enthusiastic scientist. Maybe at times he’d been a little _too_ enthusiastic (and maybe at times he’d been a little too friendly), but the old endearing passion was gone, and it was sad, just looking at the man he’d turned into.

She didn’t reply further to his greeting, just coolly broke his gaze and looked around the room.

They seemed to be in some sort of basement. There were two desktop computers on a card table to Gwen’s left, and more advanced machinery on the floor beside them. A masked figure stood away in a shadowed corner of the room, and Gwen wasn’t sure she wanted to know what that was about. There were five guards present, a few of which she recognized from the scene in the street. Two stood at attention while three gathered around another card table and one dealt out a hand of rummy. Gwen was willing to bet they were all Extremis test subjects.

The silence with which she had replied to Killian was finally broken when an insistent beeping started up from one computer. He shot the guard standing closest to the monitor a questioning look. The man looked at the screen in confusion and shrugged back at Killian.

Gwen’s old boss sighed. “Get Maya and Loren in here. Tell them to fix it.” The guard nodded and disappeared behind a door and, by the sound of it, up a flight of stairs.

The man in the corner stepped forward. He was wearing not just a silver mask, but silver armor covering his entire body, and a dark green cloak over that. “I'm not sure if I believe my eyes, Killian. This is a lamentable excuse for the executing of a new technology. I can tolerate equipment inferior to my own when I must, but I'm questioning your competence with a new depth, now.”

Killian waved his hands in a florid, pacifying manner. “Look, Doctor… It’s ‘Doctor Doom,’ correct?”

“Yes.”

“Doctor Doom, my old man had a saying. Never judge a book by its cover, but judge a _cover_ by its _book._ Now, we have a revolutionary new technology here. And it’s housed in shoddy electronics right now, you’re right. There have been certain… funding setbacks. But with _your_ help, we could give the masterpiece that is Extremis… a shiny new cover. Give us lab space, give us workable computers, and our technologies combined could make you and I _truly_ a force to be reckoned with.”

 _It’s “you and me,”_ Gwen thought, but she refrained from correcting Killian’s grammar aloud.

There were more footsteps descending the stairs outside the door, and Maya Hansen walked in, followed close behind by a blond, blue-eyed young man who must have been Loren. The man went straight to the still beeping computer and started typing in commands.

Maya was carrying a stack of papers and turned straight to Killian. “I’ve just got the numbers back on the last batch. We’re down to eighteen percent overload, which is... Well, I wouldn’t -- ” Maya’s eyes widened when she caught sight of the familiar intern, tied securely to a chair in their criminal hideout. “You didn’t tell me you were bringing Stacy into this.” She slapped her papers down on the computer table with disapproving force. “What are you _doing,_ Killian? She never worked on Extremis!”

“I have a plan, Maya.” Killian walked over to his fellow scientist and placed his hands on her upper arms in a conciliatory gesture that was, for the Killian that Gwen knew, oddly dominant. “Calm down. Loren, what’s with that computer? Is it broken?”

Tapping keys on the machine, Loren made a so-so gesture, and Doom went very still, looking intently at the computer lackey. Oblivious to the look, Loren went back to typing. “I keep telling you, there’s nothing specific wrong. This OS is just a mess,” the programmer insisted.

Doom stepped around to look at the monitor for himself as Loren continued to explain Killian’s options to him.

“At this point, I say just download Ubuntu and reinstall your programs. Dr. Killian, you’ll need to log into your account and back up anything you want to keep into this drive.” The blond held up a small rectangular device. “Unless you’d rather get a StarkTech OS, but that’s not fr -- ”

The was a click that cut through the room with disconcerting volume, and Gwen closed her eyes against a blinding flash of light. When she opened them and blinked away a cloudy after-image, Loren was gone.

No, in fact he had fallen to the ground and was trying to push himself to his feet. There was a field of some sort of strange light coming from the machines by the computer table and directed at the struggling programmer. Doom straightened up, having bent down slightly to punch some command into the device at the source. Those must be Doom’s machines, and they were giving off some sort of energy -- what looked too glowy and coherently directed to be anything but magic. And it was hurting Loren, making it impossible for him to stand.

Doom picked the blond up by the shoulder and deposited him in the chair, and the beam remained trained on him. The man didn’t budge from the seat, barely able to lift his head with whatever the machine was doing to him. The silver-clad villain turned to Killian. “How long has this man worked for you?”

“A little over a week. He came very highly recommended, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t--”

“Your new programmer is a magic user,” Doom informed him flatly.

Killian gaped briefly, then narrowed his eyes. “What kind of magic user?”

“The kind with millennia of study in his past.”

“How can you know that?” Killian questioned.

“This gesture.” Doom moved one armored hand to imitate the non-committal motion Loren had used to reply to Killian earlier. “He is too well practiced in magic, and cannot hide its accent in how he speaks with his hands.”

Loren closed his eyes briefly, clearly calling himself an idiot within the confines of his head.

Killian crossed his arms and looked down at his employee. “Well, well. Loren Olson. Or… let me guess. Is it _Loki?_ ”

Loren struggled to smile. “A singular displeasure, as always, to be in your company, Dr. Killian. Dr. Doom.” He nodded weakly, a satire of composure and manners.

Doom pressed a few more buttons on the machinery, but nothing visibly changed. “Loki. You've made yourself hard to find. I may not have been able to reach you over the past months, but you can never escape Doom entirely.”

From her chair, Gwen took to scrutinizing Doom’s device more thoroughly. It was, as far as she could tell, some kind of field generator. While she didn’t know enough about magic to be able to say how it was affecting Loki, there were plenty of components she recognized. She was willing to hypothesize that that one bit was a magnetron, and… well… if Loki were human, he’d probably be dead.

If the other elements of the machine were modifying and focusing the microwave beam, then fiddling with them could be dangerous, especially for the more cook-able humans in the room. But a magnetron couldn’t any kind of energy beam without power to its magnet. So the safest point to attack it would be the connection between the magnetron and the power source. Two little insulated wires.

While the men talked, Maya picked up her papers off the computer table and walked close past Gwen, and the teenager could hear the distinctive metallic slide of a filing cabinet opening somewhere just behind her and to her left.

Then came Maya’s voice, very low. “I’m sorry. I never thought Killian would go this far.”

Gwen hung her head, so no one standing would see her lips move when she replied quietly. “Then help me escape.”

The sound of paper sliding against paper. “If I just untied you, we’d both get caught.”

Oblivious to their exchange, Killian was getting caught up in conversation with Loki, lording over him with the facts of his newfound advantages. He gestured at Doom. “I have a new sponsor, and with luck, another helper soon to arrive. I recall Spider-Man offering to work for me, and I’ve decided to take him up on his offer.”

Gwen kept her head ducked and replied to Maya with an alternative suggestion. “Don’t untie _me_. Untie _Loki_. If you get close enough to disable Doom’s machine, he can get free.”

“Help _Loki?_ That sounds like… a bad idea.”

“He won’t hurt us if we help him,” Gwen assured her, hoping it was true. “Dr. Hansen, _please,_ I need to get out of here. I don’t know what they’ll do to me.”

The woman sighed in acquiescence. “What exactly do you need me to do?”

Gwen started explaining about the two wires that needed to be cut to safely disable the device.

The blond haired man who was Loki sent both women a look that quickly turned knowing. He focused back on Killian and encouraged his self-congratulatory lecture. “Whatever happened to working alone, Killian? What happened not seeking the interference of a villain, or the help of an enemy?”

Killian smiled, and circled his hand through the air as if catching at the most elegant phrasings as he spoke. “Well, it’s a beautiful thing, desperation. Can’t afford to be as picky as I once was. Between your interference and a certain lack of progress on our designs, I’ve reconsidered. And it’s different with Doom. He and I share a certain set of _principles_. We both understand the human need… to perfect ourselves. To shed old flaws, old weaknesses, and _rebuild._ And as for those whose goals run less parallel to mine, well…”

With all eyes on Killian and his new prisoner, Maya casually picked up the little plastic letter opener off the top of the filing cabinet and walked over to resume her place next to her boss. And if she happened to stand very close to Doom’s machine, very few people took note of the fact.

Killian walked toward Loki and rested a hand on the computer table. “Leverage is key, Loki. Really, you taught me that, with what you said about Tony and Peter. And what the world would do to get them back. That’s why I’m making the acquaintance of Gwen, here. See, I’m coming to the… somewhat embarrassing conclusion that only Spider-Man can stabilize the serum.” He shot Maya a pointed look. “But he can’t be trusted without the right incentive. And if I have Spider-Man’s girlfriend, well then that solves that problem.”

Loki’s eyes moved back to Gwen and looked her over carefully.

Gwen suddenly didn’t feel as guilty over how rotten _Peter_ had had it when being introduced to _her_ folks. _Well, Peter, at least you weren’t tied to a chair and surrounded by the criminally insane._

Killian went on. “Likewise, I didn’t feel comfortable working with _you_ before, but once I have enough leverage, that could be a very different story. Doom and I have had a good long talk about you. You know what he recommends? He says that if we find Jor and Fenrir you’ll fall right in line. That the key to Loki, is Loki’s children. Leverage is key.”

Loki looked briefly confused and then laughed. “Oh dear. Another one who’s been reading earth mythology. Oh _please,_ good sir, _don’t_ hurt my children. And while you’re at it, do be kind to my _father_ the _lightning strike_ and my _mother_ the _grassy field._ ”

Doom laughed right back at him and stepped forward, and Maya took the opening to bend down and cut the wires, standing and pocketing the letter opener before anyone turned to look.

The field of light from Doom’s machine stuttered strobe-like for a moment and then flicked out. Loki smiled, and the room erupted into chaos.

The chair in which Loki sat clattered to the floor as he jumped back to gain a little distance. There was an exchange of magical projectiles between Loki and Doom, and Killian’s and Doom’s machines alike were caught in the crossfire with bursts of sparks and high, fizzing whines and smells of burning metal and plastic.

Gwen yelped when some sort of glowing metal ammunition from Doom’s armor narrowly missed her and hit the filing cabinet behind with a loud, metallic _crunch_ , followed shortly by the crackling sounds of paper catching fire.

Killian’s guards moved in on Loki, and that was when things really started to go the god’s way. Loki had backed himself into a cramped corner of the room, and his opponents found themselves fighting at closer quarters than they were used to, the precision of Loki’s movements granting him a disproportionate advantage, while the guards functioned as unwitting not-quite-human shields against Doom’s attack spells.

When the last of Killian’s guards fell dead, Loki stood in his dark-haired Asgardian form, armored and panting and grinning and eerily unsinged.

“How are you not burned?” Killian demanded, properly scared now.

“I came well-prepared. Burn prevention: a simple magic, when given enough time to set in place.”

Maya pushed at her boss’s shoulder. “Killian, run. C’mon.”

Loki’s grin widened as he drew another throwing dagger. “Yes, Killian, _run._ ”

The scientist started running, and Loki threw his dagger just as Doom shot another spell at Loki, throwing off his aim so the dagger hit Killian’s torso at a less-than-vital point, the wound glowing orange as the man made for the door.

Loki drew still another knife, but Doom attacked the trickster bodily while his attention was elsewhere, and the chance was lost. With Maya Hansen running behind Killian, and Doom making Loki’s arm unsteady, he couldn't throw another dagger without hitting one of the saboteurs who had helped him escape. He muttered a curse and turned his focus back to Doom.

The two men grasped and pushed at each other, each trying to gain a comfortable fighting distance without granting the other an advantage of relative stance.

Or so it seemed. Out of sight to Doom, Gwen could see that Loki’s hands had turned blue, and there was ice creeping along the metal of Doom's armor, and she watched in fascination as some of the surfaces seemed to shrink a bit, bringing to mind the bending of a bimetal thermometer exposed to a sharp temperature drop.

One crunching blow from Loki, and Doom’s armor cracked and partially shattered at the waist. He fell to the ground, but the armor falling away only revealed machine parts, similarly bent and weakened.

Loki pushed his opponent flat to the ground, and meeting with far less struggle from the crippled machine now, held him down for several minutes while another layer of ice crept over the whole of the robot’s body. Gwen could feel cold air pooling around her feet, taking up speed until it became a breeze and the air was dry enough to prick unpleasantly at her nose. The filing cabinet behind her whined with the temperature difference, air moving fast through narrow passages as fire met the spreading chill. She thought she could see nitrogen liquefying against the some of the iced-over surfaces of Doom’s armor.

Loki stood and brought down a booted foot through the brittle metal of the Doombot’s head, and then again through a vital-looking point in its torso. Addressing what remained of the machine, he said softly, “Next time, I hope we meet in person.”

Gwen took a breath and them said a little unsteadily, “I’m not coming along to that meeting, if that’s alright.”

Loki smirked at that and watched his hands turn back from blue to beige, rubbing them together gingerly. Then he approached Gwen and knelt to untie her, and did so quickly enough that Gwen was sure magic must have been involved.

Once all the ropes were gone, he stood away. “Can you stand?”

It was a good question. Her legs were a little stiff from being tied into position, and watching mass-killings really wasn’t a daily occurrence for her. “I think so. Give me a hand up.”

Loki obliged, and when Gwen found her feet to be steady enough under her, he led her out of the house and onto the sidewalk outside.

It was still light out, which she found disorienting. The scene in the house had felt like something that should only happen on a dark and stormy night. The street was unfamiliar, but the drive here hadn’t been long, so Gwen was willing to guess she was still in walking distance of her house.

“Do you know your way home from here?” Loki asked.

Gwen reached for her cell phone and frowned. “Um, they took my things.”

Loki considered for a moment, then sighed. He muttered a spell, and a perfect double of him appeared to Gwen’s right. “Stay here,” the real Loki said, seemingly to both Gwen and the illusion, and he went off to search the house.

Gwen waited out on the sidewalk for him to return. When the silence grew long, she addressed the double of Loki. “So, um… do you _talk_ , or do you just stand there and look menacing?”

The Loki clone tossed her an amused look. “I just stand here and look menacing,” he assured her, and went back to doing just that.

“Right.” Gwen nodded and spent the rest of the wait in silence.

The illusion vanished when Loki returned with Gwen’s backpack and cell phone, the latter of which she used to check her location and call a cab.

“You can get home safely from here?” the villain questioned after she hung up the phone.

“I’m actually going to Stark Tower,” Gwen corrected.

He did a good job at feigning light surprise. “Very well.”

“And you’re coming with me so you can tell SHIELD everything you know about Killian’s network from your most recent infiltration,” she added in a tone that brokered no argument.

“I _am_ not,” Loki disagreed calmly in spite of her tone.

Gwen rounded on him. “Do you _really_ want to stop Killian?”

“I can do it on my own terms.”

“Well, Tony Stark is gonna try, too. ...I hear. Probably by doing something really reckless. And unpredictable. Do you want him barging in and getting himself killed? Like, right in the middle of your show? Because that could get really inconvenient, for you. Or do you want to do something? Keep him from messing up your plans? There’s only one good way to do that: show up at that tower and _tell_ Mr. Stark enough to keep him out of your game.”

Loki stood still for a moment, just staring at her. Perhaps he sensed that she was up to something, but Gwen hadn’t actually lied, which hopefully gave him little to go on. At last, the god smiled lightly and said, “Oh, I _like_ you. Stark Tower it is then.”

The magician waved a hand and was immediately clothed in less conspicuous garb. Once the cab arrived and they were both seated inside, Loki told the driver where to go and added, “Keep the car outside and wait once we arrive. With any luck this will be a very brief visit.”

Gwen managed to look away before she smiled triumphantly.

 

.:.

Peter was spending the afternoon at Stark Tower, enjoying the freedom that came after school on a Friday, when Monday was far away and the development of an as yet unborn Iron Man suit was well underway in front of him. What a way to unwind.

They’d met with Jack McGee for an interview on Thursday, and Peter’s mind was still reeling a bit from the prep he’d undergone beforehand, talking through his story, practicing for the questions the reporter was likely to ask. “He has a script, but reporters have a way of going off-script,” Pepper had told him. “Or, at least, the good ones do.” McGee had behaved, though, probably because the story they were offering was too good in its own right for a smart man to risk annoying Tony Stark just to get a few more juicy details.

And when he wasn’t going over the previous day in his head, thinking over his words and wondering how they would come across in print, Peter’s train of thought kept drifting further back, to his conversation with Pepper from before, when she had said Tony was different before Peter showed up. That he was more alive now.

It was a nice feeling, but it was also unquestionably scary, to suddenly matter this much to someone he’d never known. And, in a euphoric and totally unreal sort of way, to suddenly matter so much to someone he’d known _about_ all his life. It was like a fairy tale. Really it _was_ a fairy tale, since being the son of Iron Man was no different from being a prince in New York, except perhaps that it was _cooler_.

Saying _thank you_ seemed in order, but also felt wrong. Like the formality would come across as trying put distance between Tony and himself. So, he should say something else, maybe not _thank you_ exactly, but just to let the guy know that… “Tony,” he finally said aloud, “I’m glad you’re my dad. You know that, right?”

Tony frowned a little as he tugged his attention from his work. And then he frowned more deeply, confused. “Peter, don’t do that. I know I’m not much a _dad._ ”

Expecting bravado and not this, Peter was caught off guard. “Yeah -- no, um. Well, my mom never talked about you, so I kind of assumed you’d be an irresponsible jerk or something. And I guess sometimes you _are_...” This wasn’t going quite as Peter had planned, but he forged on. “It’s just, it’s like you said. We’re family. I just mean I’m glad you’re my family. I didn’t know I’d be glad to meet you. But I actually really am.” He shrugged and repeated, “I’m really glad that you’re my family.”

Tony glanced sideways at him in a look that was warm, and still very much confused.

Peter shook his head and gave up, smiling at his own silliness. “Forget it.”

They lapsed into a long silence as the build reached a difficult point that pulled in all the attention Tony had to give. He was adjusting the new repulsor in the left gauntlet to shoot a more powerful blast than previous models without creating a life-threatening level of acceleration on the kickback, by building in a safety mechanism that didn’t let the device reach maximum charge until it was already firing.

“Can I ask a question?” Peter started once the most delicate work seemed to be over.

Tony didn’t answer, which Peter was learning to interpret as meaning the man was still too deep in his work to immediately register that Peter had spoken off the topic of the build. “Hand me those wirecutters,” Tony ordered when he next spoke.

It was five minutes later that Tony’s attention snapped to Peter and he asked, “Did you say something?”

“Uh-huh,” Peter replied as if no time had passed. “I was just wondering if you and Pepper are together?” At the look Tony sent him, Peter added, “There were a bunch of magazine covers about it a few years ago.” Hard to avoid gossip if you ever had to wait in line at the grocery store.

“Well, if you believe the tabloids, we had three children, got married twice, and divorced... at _least_ seven times.” Tony paused in setting wires in the gauntlet to play with the display above and check how much slack he needed for the elbow joint to flex. “Honestly, though? Yeah, we were together for a little bit, couple years back. We tried. _She_ was perfect.” Tony frowned abruptly. “That was our first problem.”

After a pause, Peter prodded, “I guess my mom wasn’t perfect?”

Tony snorted. “What clued you in, the devil horns?”

Peter laughed too. “I dunno, they look more like some kind of gazelle to me.”

“Well, you’re the biologist. But now I’m never trusting a gazelle again.”

“Dude. _Not_ how science works. Correlation, causation…”

“ _Hey,_ ” Tony pointed the wire cutters at him. “I was inventing science _long_ before you were born.”

“ _You_ invented science?” Peter questioned, grinning.

“With my bare hands.”

Dum-E made a hurt sound.

They were interrupted when Jarvis spoke up. “Sir, Miss Gwen Stacy has just entered the building. And there is a man with her who appears to be Loki.”

“Loki?” Tony echoed blankly, too stunned to work even the slightest intonation into his voice.

“ _Gwen?_ ” Peter questioned, a little more emphatically. “Why would Gwen and Loki be here together?”

“Loki?” Tony repeated, still more than a little lost.

Peter addressed the AI. “Jarvis, do you know what they’re doing here?”

“A moment,” Jarvis said, then after a pause, “Miss Stacy has informed me that Loki aided her escape from a kidnapping engineered by Aldrich Killian and Victor Von Doom. And he has agreed to provide further information about the plans and resources of her kidnappers.”

“Thanks, Mom,” Peter breathed, falling back in his seat. “Are they on their way up?”

“I’m directing them to a conference room on the floor below. Shall I ask them to meet you here instead?”

“No,” Tony said quickly, setting down his wire cutters, alert now that he’d recovered from his surprise. “We’ll go talk to them.” He turned to walk down, and there was more determination than happiness in his stride. “Peter, you coming?”

Peter followed him without a word.

They reached the conference room before the others arrived and circled around the table to stand by the windows and wait. Peter sent Tony a cautious look. “You okay?”

Tony started a bit at the question. “ _Me?_ Yeah! Couldn’t be worse. Better. Yeah. Fine.”

Peter acknowledged that with one slow, bemused nod and turned to stare at the door until Loki walked in, with Gwen not far behind.

The mischief god had taken nothing of his usual conspicuous form of dress in with him, which was probably how he had passed relatively unnoticed while making his way through the lower parts of the tower at Gwen’s side. Hair usually covered by a large gold helmet was revealed to be black in color and neatly swept back to fall at the nape of his neck. His shirt was the orange-brown color that was named gold in any material that did not shine.

Once in the room, he looked over Peter and Tony with an air of both interest and a forced sort of distant apathy that made so much more sense now than it had seemed to last time. “Here we are, then,” the god said calmly. “I have news about Aldrich Killian that may be... of…”

But Loki trailed off as he fully processed looks being sent his way. Tony and Peter stood side-by-side, arms crossed, staring him down with matching _we need to talk_ faces.

“...Ah,” Loki said weakly. “Am I to assume I’m down a few aliases since last we spoke?”

“Sit,” Tony said, indicating a chair.

Loki glanced between the two of them with clear trepidation, and sat. His eyes settled on Peter. “Peter...”

Peter offered him a quick, insincere smile. “Hi, mom.”

Gwen took a step toward the door. “I’m gonna go… send away your cab.”

Loki replied with a glare full of betrayed trust. The twisting of his mouth was either disgust or a bitter, admiring sort of amusement.

“Yeah,” Gwen added on a short exhale and walked out awkwardly, leaving them to it.

Once the three were alone, Loki looked back to the other two men. He visibly searched for words, gave up, and pressed his lips together. His eyes slid back to Tony, who was resting his forehead against a curled finger and expressively looking anywhere but at Loki. “Tony.”

Tony’s face also contorted into a smile, deep and grim. “Yes, dear?”

Loki flinched.

Tony kept staring at the wall.

Looking between the two of them, Peter suddenly felt all the unwelcome tension of a child watching his parents fight. He was one of the adults too, and he was pissed off too, but part of him was still a kid and didn’t like this at all. And this was worse than his adoptive parents, because Ben and May had never gone _cold_ and _quiet_ like the three of them were right now.

He decided it was time to switch gears, and called in his courage.

Peter shyly cleared his throat.

When the other two looked at him, he met Loki’s eyes. “So, um, I missed you,” Peter confessed, scratching the back of his head and immediately looking away, because god, this was _awkward._

“Peter,” Loki said again, and his usually composed voice sounded cracked and uncertain. “I’ve missed you too.”

“Then -- then why didn’t you come back? I mean...”

“I’ve been busy,” Loki said, and then winced again at how inadequate that sounded. “...In the sense of fleeing law enforcement and worse. It would have put you in danger.”

“Right.” And now Peter was back to feeling _really_ pissed off. Because after _ten years,_ that was her -- his -- excuse? Rage tightened in Peter’s chest and pulled his hands into fists. “And so, leaving me alone for all those years, that didn’t put me in danger? What if I _needed_ you? Okay: what if I was in trouble? I _know_ ,” Peter added, seeing the flaws in his logic and somehow just getting more angry. “I _know_ you left the bag with me and you came when we got captured, and--and when Gwen got kidnapped, but _besides that._ Besides that. Where were you... when May and Ben lost their jobs? Where were you when I got bitten by a spider and I wasn’t sure what to do or what I was turning into? Where were you for all the stupid shit I did when that was going down? _Where were you when my uncle died?!_ ”

Then _Tony_ winced and, still shouting, Peter added, “NOT _YOU_!” He rounded back on Loki, who looked completely, brokenly horrified at everything Peter had just let off his chest. Peter’s anger fizzled out when he realized how severely it had hit its mark. More softly, he repeated, “So where were you?”

“...I was running away.”

“Do that a lot?”

“Yes,” Loki granted with a self-hating smile.

There was silence, which Tony ultimately broke. “Okay, look. Rune-be-ki-whatever-your-name-is...”

“Loki,” the god prompted softly. “Please.”

“Loki,” Tony acquiesced, looking at the person he had loved, for the first time both knowing him and matching the right name to him. “ _Loki_. Okay, just--just tell me one thing: _WHAT were you thinking?!_ Seriously. _What?_ I was in _love_ with you. You were _pregnant with my child_. And I get a--a _note_? Telling me _nothing_ of use, unless I bother to look at the _first letter of every word_ because apparently I need the decoder ring from the bottom of a cereal box just to be in a relationship with you? How could you do that? You took my son away from me. You took _you_ away from me. _How could you do that?_ ”

A frown, confused. “You’re angry that I _left_?”

“ _What the fuck kind of question is that?_ ”

Loki’s mouth opened slightly and his eyes focused on the table between them in a slow frown. “I expected you to be angry because I created Rebecca. Because I deceived you.”

“Nope. That’s how we met. I mean, not really, but in the way that matters. So no, I’m not mad about that part. But the fact that you _disappeared?_ And what you took with you? _Jesus._ ”

"And if I had stayed?” Loki whispered, but his voice rose as he spoke. “If I had told you the truth? If you learned back then that you had invited a villain into your bed, and offered a Frost Giant your hand in marriage? What then?"

"THEN THE OFFER WOULD HAVE STOOD!"

Loki looked stricken for a full two seconds, leaning back into his chair and staring at Tony with wide eyes.

Then the god’s expression darkened and turned to a slow, mocking smile. "No," he said with a slight shake of his head and a tone of soft, ironic certainty.

Tony balled his fists, made an inarticulate noise of frustration, and left the room.

Peter watched Tony leave and then looked to Loki. “You’re being an idiot, you know that?”

Loki stared at the door Tony had exited through, and spoke very softly. “When it comes to that man, I am rarely anything else.”

“Why did you stay away so long?”

Loki’s eyes finally turned to Peter, lit with love and apology and caution. “From you? I never meant to, but the realms are a dangerous place for my children, and people generally seek them through me.”

“Why did you stay away from Tony, is what I kinda actually meant.”

“Oh.” Loki sighed. “Him, I never meant to return to. It was cruel enough to stay as long as I did the first time.”

“ _Really?_ But that’s so… not fair. For everyone.” Peter shrugged helplessly. “I wish you’d told me about him. He’s...”

“You would have sought him out. The realms are a dangerous place for my children, and Tony’s world is doubly so. But you seem to have found your way into that world all on your own.”

“Actually, I was looking for _you_.”

Loki leaned his head back and smiled that self-hating smile again. “Of course. Well, you found me. Was it worth it?”

Peter circled the table to get closer to Loki. There was a lot anger in this still, and part of him wanted to go back to shouting at Loki, no matter how much it hurt both of them, just to burn through all the kindling that was ten years left waiting, and the fact Loki had met him again and _not told_ him, had let him believe…

But Peter wasn’t sure how long Loki would stay. Or if he even wanted to. And there was anger, but then there was gratitude and admiration and hope, so many words built up over the past decade, where the burning had less to do with resentment, more to do with uncomfortable warmth and devotion easily betrayed.

“You told me once to never doubt that I was wanted.” Peter found himself looking in every direction and nervously fiddling with the backs of the chairs he was passing as he slowly chose his words, because this was scary and hard. “I kind of -- I kind of assumed that meant _you_ wanted me. And that you always would. Was I wrong to think that?”

Loki stood slowly in the silence left by that question, thinking. His eyes were once again trained down at the table in front of his seat as he sorted through the bitter implications of the fact that Peter had to ask at all. He met Peter’s eyes with visible hesitation and said simply, “No. You weren’t wrong.”

“Then _of course_ it was worth it.” Peter shrugged incredulously. “How could it not be worth it? I found my _mom_. I actually _found_ you. I…” He was grinning helplessly, a maybe a little close to tears. And dammit, so much crying lately, but what were you supposed to do when you were talking to your mother for the first time in ten years?

Loki stepped forward and embraced him, arms wrapped tight around Peter’s shoulders, warm and close and right, and Peter clung to him, deciding that he wasn’t going to let this hug end _ever_.

Loki seemed to be pretty much in agreement about that, so they held and held and maybe got each other’s shoulders a bit wet with a few quiet tears.

Peter’s legs were getting sore from holding him still for the hug by the time they were interrupted by Pepper poking her head in the door. Loki and Peter didn’t so much move apart as shift to face her with their arms still loosely wrapped around each other.

If Pepper thought that was adorable, she managed to give no sign of it. “Loki, SHIELD is holding a meeting here tomorrow at eleven, and they’d like you there to debrief them on your last encounter with Killian.”

Peter frowned. To his mom, he asked, “How did SHIELD find out you were here?”

Loki looked at Pepper, lightly affronted. “You can’t possibly expect me to come when called.”

Peter shrugged awkwardly in Loki’s embrace. “If they’re going to fight Killian, I’m going to help them. I _have_ to -- I helped create him. The more we know about who we’re up against, the safer that’ll be.”

Loki leaned his forehead against the top of Peter’s head and let out an exasperated breath. “ _Right._ I’ll be there.”

Once Pepper left, Peter finally pulled away. “So, I should probably see how Gwen’s doing. She just got kidnapped because of me, I gotta go be a good boyfriend. I’ll see you tomorrow, though, right?”

“You will.”

Peter nodded, leaned in for one last hug, and went on his way. “Jarvis, locate Gwen Stacy?”

Loki stood for quite a while after Peter left, paralyzed by thoughts and memories and a world of fears made more present and chilling by the people whose impermanence inspired such fears.

He should have collected himself more quickly and left while he could, and he realized that when Tony returned to the room.

 

.:.

Tony wasn’t faring much better than Loki at gathering himself and his mind into working order, but he returned out of a sense of a conversation unfinished, and the knowledge that as angry as he was, this might really be his only chance speak to Loki. He wasn’t sure what more there was to be said, but he was sure that there was more, and he wasn’t going to let Loki leave without a word. Not again.

Loki started sharply upon seeing him, then grimaced. “Ah, Tony. I was just going. I think I’ve overstayed my welcome.”

“I don’t,” Tony said bluntly.

And there, that was something that needed saying.

Loki frowned at him in plain confusion that broke Tony’s heart a little to see. The inventor wasn’t sure exactly how to take that look, whether Loki disbelieved that he would be _allowed_ to linger, or had no desire to do so. No way to know which one of them to feel more sorry for, whether the sensation of the floor dropping away under Tony’s feet was hurt for himself or pity for Loki. Odd how easily they could be one and the same after all this time.

Loki shrugged, ending the paused moment. “At any rate, I’ll be back tomorrow, as I’m sure Peter will tell you. I’m to brief SHIELD on Killian’s newfound ally. If you wish to shout at me more then, there’s little I can do to stop you.”

“ _Loki…_ ” Tony started, exasperated and still _needing_ to say _something._ But what?

“Yes?” Loki asked sharply, with just enough challenge in his eyes that possible words came flooding into Tony’s head.

_I still care about you. I still love you. I still need you and it feels like I’ll die if I say those things and you don’t answer._

Tony froze, not able -- willing? -- to speak those words. Instead, he gave Loki a hard look. “ _You’re_ the one who left. So I’m not gonna say it first. That’s on you.” He turned to walk away, but stopped and turned back when Loki took hold of his arm. A strong male hand gripping him through his shirtsleeve, familiar and utterly not. Tony watched its owner expectantly.

“Tony Stark, I...”

Loki tried. He really did. Tony could see the effort of the other man fighting to speak past his fears. And falling flat, lapsing into silence and not breaking it. Whatever courage Loki had summoned, it wasn’t enough. And there was no guarantee of exactly what he would say if he did have the conviction to speak his mind. Loki released Tony’s arm without a word.

Tony grimaced, biting the inside of his lip a little, and then nodded once. “Okay, then.” And then he did walk away, and Loki didn’t stop him.

 

.:.

Peter showed up about ten minutes early for the next day’s meeting, and found the Avengers already gathered. Tony introduced him as, “Peter. Um. My new intern. Yeah. That.” Peter played along and shook hands with all the Avengers in turn. He figured they probably all knew of his kinship to Tony. After all, Bruce knew and Pepper knew, and Black Widow was clearly eyeing up the same similarities in facial structure that Jarvis had pointed out between him and Tony.

The young man sat happily for several minutes and mingled with legends, persuading Thor to tell a story of arranged marriages and cross-dressing that was -- unbeknownst to the thunder god -- one Peter knew well from his mother’s telling.

Loki arrived about one minute before the meeting was due to start. No sign of Fury, who sometimes liked to make a dramatic entrance at the last moment. But a god showing up, well, that was pretty dramatic in its way.

Tony had known he was coming, but it didn’t stop his chest from doing _uncomfortable things_ when Loki appeared in the doorway, dressed casually as yesterday. Casual for Loki, anyway -- dark grey slacks and a white button-down shirt.

In the past Tony had noticed Loki was witty and handsome -- in a too-crazy-to-seriously-consider kind of a way. He’d felt chemistry upon touching him. There had been connection there. But it was amazing how much the meaning of a face could change in a matter of days, suddenly so much easier to read, suddenly full of associations and painful grace. Suddenly so hard to look away from.

But Tony did, forcing a cavalier smile onto his face as he looked to the other Avengers. “Well, we’ve got Solid Snake. Soon as the Big Boss gets here, we’ll be good to go.”

Everyone else stared at Loki far more openly than Tony allowed himself. But it was Steve who took the lead and gave the newcomer a courteous nod. “Loki. Why don’t you take a seat. Director Fury should be here any minute.”

Loki nodded and wordlessly found a seat opposite Tony. Natasha and Clint both shifted slightly as Loki sat, brushing back hair and tugging clothing into place and other small motions one could use to double-check the locations of one’s concealed weapons.

Next to Tony, Peter stared at Loki as much as the others, and refrained from offering any familiar greeting, preserving the anonymity his mother generally worked so hard to defend. But Loki looked at Peter and his eyes crinkled just slightly in a brief hint of a smile.

Then Loki sent around an inquiring look, and five pairs of eyes suddenly went to the table, starting with Thor’s, as everyone remembered their manners, or perhaps realized that Loki seemed level-headed enough to notice that their manners were bad.

Only Natasha kept looking, but she justified it by starting a conversation. “So Loki. What’s Fury offering you in exchange for helping us?”

“Nothing.” Loki shrugged neatly. “We have a common enemy.”

She raised her eyebrows. “Of course we do. The criminal network in New York’s been in splinters for a decade. Everyone has a common enemy. Doesn’t explain why you’re here.”

Loki shifted in his chair as he visibly considered his answer, tugging his shirt into place in a subtle mockery of one of her earlier motions. “Doctor Killian and Doctor Doom have both crossed me _very personally_ of late. ‘Enemy’ may be too kind a word.”

“So personally that you’re willing to team up with Thor?” Clint inquired, gesturing at the large blond next to him, who had so far very wisely kept to himself.

“Don’t remind me,” Loki said, and left it at that.

Fury walked in then, and all eyes turned to the director as he strode around and settled into a chair at the head of the table, setting down a small black brief case up in front of him. “I take it you’ve all met Loki.”

“In one form or another,” Tony agreed.

“Alright, I guess we can skip -- And who are you?” Fury demanded, pointing at Peter.

Peter looked to Tony and said, “I--I thought everyone knew.”

Tony spread his hands in a gesture of indignation at Peter’s lack of faith in his discretion. “Yeah, but no one who _told anyone else_.”

“Wait, wait. I think I can guess.” Fury sighed and pulled a newspaper out of his briefcase. He held it up to demonstrate the headline. **_Tony Stark Reveals Spider-Man is his Long-Lost Son._**

Beneath that was a photo of Tony and Spider-Man, arms around each other’s shoulders, each holding their free hand up high to offer the camera matching peace signs. Spider-Man's face was hidden by his mask, but Tony’s grin in the photo was incandescent. The subheading simply read, _This is not a joke._

Looking from the paper to Fury’s face, Peter smiled his best _I am a charming young man who totally didn’t just break your favorite vase_ smile, which he usually reserved for his aunt May. “Good guess.”

Tony propped an elbow on the table and leaned his head against his fist. “Ye-ah. Just, nobody tell anyone else.”

Steve, Thor and Clint were all just reading over the headline blankly, struggling to take it in.

Natasha shrugged. “I read the paper this morning.”

Steve spoke without taking his eyes from the paper. “Didn’t get the chance.”

“Nor I,” said Thor.

Clint shook his head slowly. “I skipped straight to local news.”

Natasha sent him a glance. “This is pretty local.”

“Noticed that.”

Steve finally detached his gaze from the newsprint and looked to the newly revealed father and son. “Well. Congratulations, you two, this must be very, um, a very exciting discovery for you.”

Peter nodded. “Thank you, sir.”

“So what are you doing _here_?” Fury questioned.

Tony took that one. “Peter is the resident expert on Extremis. He understands it better than any other person at this table.”

It took another conspicuously quiet moment for that to sink in, while people looked between Peter and Tony and arrived at an uneasy awareness that when it came to intelligence, the apple may have fallen closer to the tree than the _tree_ had.

Fury gave Peter a clear, appeased look, then raised his eyebrows and said, “Alright. Tell me about it.”

Peter did. “Extremis was initially intended as a medical technology, rewriting the human genetic code to heal from injury and disease. The idea was to replace damaged organs through an upgraded version of the body’s own healing mechanisms. The obvious problem being that it kept exploding. What they’ve been looking for is an algorithm to balance the rate of healing so that doesn’t happen.”

Peter realized that he’d lost his audience to an apparent non sequitur and backtracked a bit. “So basically, you’re regrowing tissue at a far-greater-than-human rate. That’s metabolism, and metabolism produces heat. The Extremis changes allow for greater heat resistance in the tissues, but that’s got an upper limit if you stick with a biology that still even vaguely approximates human. The problem they’ve been having is when healing is accelerated enough to raise the body temperature above that limit. It creates a sort of panic reaction in the cells, a feedback loop where cell damage leads to cell regeneration which leads to more heat which leads to more damage. Then it cascades out of all control, and once the temperature reaches the smoke point of their body fat, every tissue in the body vaporizes and becomes fuel for the resulting explosion.”

Peter cringed at what he was only now registering was some fairly graphic imagery on his part, but Fury had asked the expert, so he must have wanted accuracy. “Somehow they’ve pushed the smoke point way past normal, past the low end of black body radiation - hence the creepy glow. But it’s still not always enough. From what I’ve seen of the files, they’ve tried a lot of versions. There’s even one that vents hot gases out through the lungs - kinda halfway between panting dog and fire-breathing dragon.”

Thor spoke up. “How can these people be defeated once they have undergone such a transformation?”

“Easiest way is to expose them to enough heat to cause an overload. Beheading also works, and doing enough damage to the heart or lungs that they die before they can self-repair enough to sustain their own metabolism.”

Tony spoke next. “We’ve got some aces, though. Once a person has undergone Extremis, they need regular doses to keep them stable. We designed a virus that’ll rewrite the software they use to synthesize the serum. Once infected, their programs will synthesize an injection that stabilizes subjects already exposed to Extremis and reverses its effects, for all practical purposes. What we need is a way to sneak it into Killian’s systems without anyone finding out.”

Steve leaned forward, resting his forearms on the table. “Can’t you just let it loose on the internet?”

Peter held up two open hands, a gesture halfway between a shrug and an apology. “No good. Without up-to-date encryption data on Killian's network, we can’t manipulate his files. We could make a virus that would destroy anything that looks like it might be them, but there’d be tons of collateral damage. Digitally _and_ in terms of people blowing up.”

Natasha leaned back in her chair, swiveling it lightly from side to side as she thought. “So what we need is a plan for delivering the virus with the computers already logged on. Infiltration?”

Peter nodded. “Best thing I can think of. Be good to also have a battle plan too in case it comes to an all-out fight between us and them. What can Doom do? He has some sort of magic; Gwen told me that much.”

The director frowned at him. “Who’s _us_?”

Peter blinked.

Then he gaped as he realized what Fury meant. “You’re not _seriously_ considering not letting me fight with you guys are you?” He looked around, and realized they were. “Look, I’m good at this stuff, I promise. I won’t get in your way, I’ve fought against Extremis subjects before so I know my way around their abilities -- ”

“And just how _old_ are you?” the director cut in.

“Seventeen,” Peter replied, and forged on, “But sir, with respect, I don’t see how that matters.”

“Of course _it matters._ I can’t recruit you for combat!”

“You can join the army at seventeen with parental permission.”

“Oh, really?” Fury indicated Tony. “And is this man your legal guardian?”

“...No,” Peter answered sullenly.

“Do you have a legal guardian who would _agree_ to letting a seventeen-year-old boy take the step from petty vigilante justice to fighting a criminal organization made up of genetically enhanced fire-breathing whatevers?”

Peter didn’t answer.

“Yeah, I didn’t _think_ so,” Fury concluded.

“But sir -- “

Loki folded his hands on the table and looked at them intently. “Mr. Parker, may I speak to you in private for a moment?”

Captain America sent Loki a bit of an untrusting glower. “I really don’t think that’s a great idea.”

Tony pushed back from the table and stood. “I’ll come too. This should be interesting. Come on, you two. Family meeting. Plus Loki,” he added for the benefit of the room.

The three stepped out into the hallway, and Peter turned around to face both of them and sagged. “You’re both going to tell me to stay out of it, aren’t you?”

Loki raised an eyebrow. “There are benefits to knowing exactly when you are beaten, Peter.”

“But I’m not!” the younger man argued in tones of defeated rebellion.

“Correct. Know when you _are_ beaten, and you know when you are _not._ Fury certainly can’t stop you from fighting anyone. He also can’t stop you from persuading Jarvis to let you listen over the security feed of the rest of the meeting to learn anything you may need to know about Doom’s fighting style and the Avengers’ planned tactics. Jarvis will do most anything he believes will better arm Tony’s loved ones against injury and demise. All Fury can stop you from doing is attending this meeting. So pretend at obedience, and save your breath.”

Wide-eyed at the turn of his luck, Peter tossed Tony a questioning glance.

The inventor crossed his arms. “I hate to say it, but the man has a point. Why don’t you go on home for now? We’ll be hashing out plans here for a while yet.”

Peter shrugged. “Yeah, alright.” He barely started toward Loki for a goodbye hug, but glanced though the glass door at the watching Avengers and changed his mind before the intent of the motion became obvious. “So. Um, I’ll see you around, yeah?”

“You will,” Loki confirmed.

Peter bit his lip and nodded firmly, taking that with a visible grain of salt, but staunchly taking it all the same. His eyes turned to his father. “Bye, Tony.”

“Sure. Stop by tomorrow if you like. I’ll still be calibrating that repulsor, you can double check my math.”

Peter snorted. “Yeah right. See you tomorrow.” And he turned to walk off toward the elevator.

As they watched their son disappear around the hallway corner, Loki leaned over and spoke quietly to Tony. “Now he won’t realize it at the last moment and get himself in trouble you can’t predict, with a head empty of strategy. You’re welcome.”

“Yeah, yeah, thanks.” Then Tony looked over at Loki and noted how intently he was still scrutinizing the corner around which Peter had disappeared. “What’s eating you?”

“‘Petty,’” Loki pronounced the word with distaste. “The director said ‘ _petty_ vigilante justice.’ Clearly, I’ve missed something important.”

Tony took a breath. “His Uncle Ben was shot a few months ago. Apparently they were tight; Peter didn’t take it too good.”

Loki swore. “I should have placed more thorough wards. He mentioned that Ben had died, but I never…” he took a slow breath, not so much calming as letting his obvious anger ice over into something harder and far better hidden. “Where is the assailant?”

Tony considered before telling him, but not for nearly as long as he probably should have. “Still on the loose. Blond hair and a star-shaped tattoo on his left wrist.”

The god nodded. “I’ll make this man wish he’d never been born.”

“Go for a clean kill,” Tony suggested. “The kid’s not especially sadistic. He wouldn’t want much more than that.”

“And what of _my_ wants? Ben was a friend.”

Tony rolled his eyes. “Look, I’m not sure how much my opinion counts with you these days, but I’m not a fan of torture.”

“Alright,” Loki said, and it sounded like acquiescence. Probably.

“...Unless it’s torture with someone I like and there’s a safeword involved,” Tony amended, repeating the pattern of speaking against his better judgement. “That’s a different thing entirely.”

“Really?” Loki raised his eyebrows and glanced sidelong at him. “I’m still _very_ interested in your opinions, Tony.”

Tony smiled to himself and tugged at his collar, feeling suddenly over-warm. He turned and pushed the door open to step back into the conference room, and Loki followed close behind.

And yup, that had been really bad judgment. Because now he had to get through the whole meeting and somehow ignore the fact that he and Loki had been successfully flirting and that… _was not going to happen._

They returned to their seats across from each other and the meeting resumed.

“What did you tell him?” asked Natasha.

“Yeah, and why _you_?” added Clint.

“Peter and I became acquainted when we first fought Killian,” Loki lied simply. “I thought he might heed what advice I could offer him in choosing his battles.”

Loki received looks of well-earned suspicion from several angles, but with Tony as an eye-witness, no one else could find grounds to openly question the trickster’s story.

Fury brought the meeting back on topic. “Alright, Loki, your turn. How much do you know about Killian’s operation, and what’s this deal he’s got going with Doom?”

“Doom is offering him funding,” Loki began. “In exchange for what, I’m not entirely certain, but he clearly has an interest in putting Extremis to his own uses…”

 

.:.

It went on like that for a while.

Tony knew with absolute certainty that he was in trouble at about the moment Loki started describing Killian’s computer systems and Extremis synthesis programs, scathing his way through inefficiencies in what he’d glimpsed of the code and relating his failed attempt to obtain his own copy and Killian’s passwords under the guise of booting a particularly user-friendly form of Linux. Damnit, but the sound and beauty and _cunning_ of his words. Lower than Rebecca’s, Tony could almost feel the texture of that voice scraping through him, and it _did_ things to him.

The inventor had to shake himself a bit when Fury’s voice cut in, because that sound did _not_ belong in any of his sexual fantasies. “You met Maya Hansen?”

Loki gave a short, asymmetrical nod. “Dr. Hansen aided our escape, but she also rescued Killian when her actions nearly resulted in his murder at my hands. She can’t be trusted as an ally or a reliable enemy.”

“Maya Hansen’s been tracked to Tennessee,” Fury informed him. “And she’s booked a single flight to Germany under the name ‘Vonnie Warren Brown.’ Far as we can tell right now, she’s cut ties with Killian, but we’re not gonna make a move there until we’re sure. Still might lead us right to him.”

“Sounds doubtful,” Loki observed.

Fury swiveled his chair to the side and folded his hand thoughtfully, forming a dramatic profile. “Yeah, but what we need is a way in. We’ve got a virus, and with the right opening we can plant it and bring down Killian’s whole operation. All we need from you now is to know how to contact Killian as an applicant for the Extremis experiments. Once we’ve got an agent inside, we’ve got a good shot.”

Loki did a quick gesture and made a stack of papers appear on the table in front of him. “I took the liberty of preparing that information before I arrived. But I think I will ask _one_ thing in exchange after all,” Loki added, as if just deciding it.

Across the table, Tony was doing his best not react outwardly to how deliciously wily Loki was being.

Fury just narrowed his eye and turned back toward the table, waiting for Loki to continue.

The god tossed Tony a knowing glance that _really didn’t help,_ before turning his eyes back to Fury and presenting his terms. “The longer Killian is on the loose, the greater the danger to the public. So, give _me_ one copy of this virus and let me try as well. May the best spy win. I’ve infiltrated Killian’s criminal network twice, and given time, I can certainly do so again. And it would expedite things if my new alias were given a current paper trail and a military background.”

Fury leaned forward and rested his hands on the table. “And what kind of idiot would I have to be to help _you_ infiltrate Killian’s network? For all I know, you’ll join him and show him our hand.”

Tony raised his hand. “Um, this kind of idiot,” he answered the rhetorical question.

Fury looked at Tony sharply. “You trust this guy?”

Tony shrugged. “ _Well_ , I’m not saying he wouldn’t lie, spy, or try to destroy valuable property. I’m just saying… isn’t that exactly what we want him to do?”

“Aptly put,” Loki agreed, sounding pleased by that turn of logic. He was looking at Tony as if he were very seriously pondering eating him whole, and Tony swallowed and looked away.

They wouldn’t act on that look. Too much lay unresolved between them. It wouldn’t be wise.

Who ever said either of them was wise?

Tony forced his thoughts back to vague order and continued. “I’ve fought next to Loki a couple times now. Not totally trustworthy, but against Killian? He hates that guy way more than he wants to pull the rug out from under any of us. I say go for it.”

Fury spoke again. “Alright. Stark, if you really are willing to vouch for this nutjob, you can show him this virus you designed and tell him how to deliver it. We’ll send a briefed SHIELD agent your way this afternoon for the same drill. You two are dismissed. Everyone else, we’re gonna draw up a more detailed strategy for the possibility of all-out battle. Rogers, any thoughts?”

As Steve started blathering about the history of Doom’s attack strategies and Tony and Loki stood to exit the room, it was driven home to Tony the extent to which Fury didn’t know his history with Loki. And now he was being sent off to spend time alone with his beautifully insane, insanely beautiful ex-lover.

Yeah. He could totally handle this. Sure.

They reached the door and Loki held it open, gesturing for Tony to lead the way out of the meeting room. And Tony walked them toward his favorite lab, because only the computers there had access to files as sensitive as that virus.

The tower had been built years after Rebecca left, so taking Loki here was new ground. Tony’s personal lab. Nothing weird about that. In a way, it made more sense than anything, because having Rebecca in his workshop had felt right in a way that only really --

Not thinking about that. Nope. Past was past.

Past was leggy, lean, attractive past, walking behind him with a gaze he could feel eyeing him up and down and mind he knew from experience could take him apart in all the right ways.

Neither spoke a word while they made their way to the right door. Once it was unlocked, they entered the lab, and --

Tony didn’t even remember making the decision. One moment they were walking side by side, the next he had Loki pressed against a wall, getting a taste of that deliciously pale neck, and Loki was making choked sounds of startled pleasure that rang through Tony’s blood, driving up the heat and pace of his pulse. Loki relaxed into the touch and got on board with it fast enough, arching close against Tony’s frame, swallowing where Tony’s lips pressed against his neck so the inventor could feel muscle and cartilage shifting smoothly under skin.

The trickster’s hands ran up and down Tony’s sides, tugging his undershirt free of his pants, seeking skin, gripping his hips once Loki found them and running one thumb over the line of bone there while his mouth sought the corner of Tony’s jaw and licked, and bit, lightly but still a thrilling measure too hard, and Tony pushed him more firmly against the wall, seeking the shape and slide and strength of bone and muscle and skin tight against his own.

It was all rush and need and pleasure and empty and cold and desolate.

Closeness without trust.

Pleasure without joy.

Desire without want.

There had been a reason why this was a bad idea.

Denying the demands of his body as they rang oddly hollow, Tony stopped, pulled himself free of Loki’s touch and backed away.

Loki still leaned back against the wall, breathing just as hard as Tony. Their eyes met for the first time after entering the room, and Tony felt a jolt. Loki’s pupils were blown wide, gaze dark with desire and darker with bitterness, and Tony did _want…_ just not quite like this.

“So,” Loki said finally, “It’s not me you’re looking for, then.”

And that was so far off the mark that Tony didn’t even know where to start. “That’s not it.”

Loki was still out of breath, still disheveled from Tony’s roaming hands, but for all that, he managed to look and speak so coldly. “You want the illusion. Everyone does. A son. A younger brother. A wife. In the end, everyone wants a shadow.”

“I’m not everyone!”

Loki stood away from the wall, straightening his shirt and walking away toward the desk. “And how would you know?” he asked calmly, as if giving the conclusive word on the matter. “You’ve never seen me as I am. My true actions. My true face. You know nothing of me but what I become to curry favor.” He reached the work table. “Tell me about this software of yours. How would one go about entering it into Killian’s computer system?”

Tony stayed where he was and didn’t accept the change in subject. “Loki, I fell in love with you eighteen years ago.” He hated how vulnerable he was making himself, but more than that he hated Loki doing this to him, basically denying that Tony had ever loved him. Eighteen years on a broken heart, and now the god had the audacity to come back and claim it wasn’t real? _Bastard._

“I fell in love with _you._ You were bitter, and broken, and miserable, and _probably_ certifiably insane. And brilliant and selfish and fucking impossible, and not nearly as good at hiding any of those things as you thought you were. Sound familiar?”

A slight frown, another tiny break in Loki’s certainty, but he shook it off quickly. “You’re fooling yourself.”

“I know _you_ are, but what am I?”

Loki twisted his head slightly back to one side, not quite rolling his eyes as he formulated a retort. Then he stilled and those eyes grew more troubled as he looked at Tony searchingly, accidentally seeking a real answer. _Just what are you, and how do you exist?_ Finally, he licked his lips and just said, “Off topic.”

“ _Really?_ ”

“The software,” Loki prompted expectantly.

“Wow. Really. Okay.” Tony took one deep breath before walking around to the other side of the table and explaining the function of the virus he and Peter had constructed.

He didn’t bother to stray off topic again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking around through these ridiculously infrequent updates. Y’all are troopers. The good news is, chapters 5 and 6 are both closer to being done than this chapter was the last time I updated. Keep at it, you who periodically poke and prod for updates. Your efforts are not in vain!


	5. It Might not be the Same

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Loki gets cornered into a few more uncomfortable conversations. And, well, not _everything_ has changed.

After exchanging curt farewells with Tony and tucking a copy of the virus away safely on his person, Loki stepped out of the lab and into the empty hallway. 

He was halfway to the elevator when Pepper walked around a corner, dressed in a neat dark grey suit and with two more decades worth of steel in her eyes than when last he’d seen her. And yet, she smiled when she stopped to stand a few feet away from the god and shifted the black portfolio she held under one arm. “Loki, hi, can we talk?” 

Stopping to stand a few feet in front of her, Loki considered. “No, actually, I-” 

“Great, come right this way, my office is a few floors down,” she said, gesturing down the hall at the lift and starting that way herself. 

Loki frowned and followed without further argument. He had to take the elevator she was heading toward to leave the building anyway, so there was no obvious escape just yet. 

Pepper went on in a friendly tone. “We used to see each other so much when you and Tony were together, but now it’s been forever since we really _talked_.” 

“If you mean ‘forever’ literally, then yes.” 

Pepper stepped into the elevator and pressed the button for her floor. “Oh, I don’t know; I’ll never forget that heart-to-heart we had when Tony first introduced us.” 

Loki followed and came to stand beside her. “Ah, yes, that day. If nothing else, I remember the look of terror on his face.” 

Pepper’s smile of answering amusement dropped away the instant the doors closed. “So,” she said bluntly, “you broke his heart.” 

Loki shrugged. “In my defense, I never actually said I _wouldn’t._ ” 

Pepper sent him a horrified look, then turned her eyes forward to glare at the elevator doors and gripped her portfolio in a deadly way. “Oh, I would slap you _so hard_ right now if I weren’t… if it weren’t for the sexism implied by me assuming you wouldn’t hit back.” 

“I’d probably pretend it hurt, just to give you the satisfaction,” Loki admitted, and he was surprised to find a little self-deprecating humor in his own voice. 

Pepper looked at him again, some of her anger fading to curiosity. “Would you? Really?” 

Loki met her look wryly. “Norns, you’re not actually _considering_ it, are you?” 

“No, I just… it’s not what I expected. You regret it, don’t you?” 

“Which part?” 

“Everything,” she guessed simply. 

Loki let out a slow exhale. “You’ve met Peter.” 

“Yes.” 

“Then you understand why I don’t.” 

Pepper tilted her head, granting him that. “He is an amazing boy. Intelligent, kind, and very mature for his age. For any age, really. It’s nice that he got to see you again, at least once or twice.” 

Loki blinked. He was being baited, he was fairly sure, but… “Is there something _you_ know that I’m not aware of?” 

She tossed him a kindly grimace that grated with condescension. “I know _you_ , if that counts. You have this habit of disappearing.” 

The god spoke with a deliberate, quiet certainty. “Not this time.” 

The elevator slowed as it reached Pepper’s floor. “Old habits die hard, Loki. And with people like you and Tony, good intentions aren’t going to cut it. You’ll be out of Peter’s life again soon enough.” The doors slid apart and she walked off. 

He stared after her and felt a renewed sympathy for Tony, as he was introduced to the unpleasant sensation of _knowing_ that he was being manipulated, but being manipulated so well that _knowing didn’t help._

Why had he let Pepper talk to him at all? He could have turned invisible, snuck onto the elevator and waited for someone else to go to the bottom floor. It would have been a lengthy escape, but surely less grueling. Or he could have turned into a pigeon and flown away. But he hadn’t thought of it in time. Likely because part of him, if he was being honest with himself, had been curious what Pepper had to say to him. 

He’d expected, he realized, to be warned away. He’d expected to be verbally thrashed for his sins, and told in no uncertain terms to walk away from Tony’s life and never return. 

And after that, as was so often requested of him, he would fade into the shadows. It was the nature of chaos, to only be welcome in one place or in one life for so long. It was the nature of people like Pepper to ensure that Loki left when it came time, before he tore too many holes that couldn’t be mended in the likes of Tony Stark. 

But she was playing a very different game with him, setting events in motion to be messier, more uncomfortable, and more hazardously, revoltingly optimistic. 

And her play was so ridiculous. As if he would abandon _Peter_ again. Damn the woman for not sticking to her part. 

The elevator doors started to close, and Loki muttered a few choice swears and sexist slurs under his breath before he hit the “door open” button and walked out after her. 

When he reached Pepper’s office, the door was open and Pepper was sitting at her desk, copying something down out of her calendar. 

“Let me ask you something, Miss Potts,” Loki said calmly as he strode into the room. “When we met, eighteen years ago, you hated me immediately.” 

Pepper finished writing and looked up, folding her hands together. “That’s not a question.” 

Loki leaned forward and rested two hands on the desk. “You sensed well enough that I planned to leave. Why did _you_ never tell Tony? How, in all your perceptiveness, did you manage to fail him as dismally as that?” 

There was a tensing in Pepper’s jaw that let Loki know he’d hit a sore spot. “It wasn’t my place.” 

“Oh, _very good._ ” Loki’s voice dripped with derision. “It was not your place tell Tony I’m a liar, and no more is it your place to tell me I can’t parent a son. I raised Peter until he was seven years old, and in that time, I loved him well. I’ve done everything in my power to keep him safe, and now that he’s old enough to get himself into every kind of trouble _without_ my help, I’ll always be here to help him out of it. And I don’t need some --” 

But Pepper cut in hotly, “If you only show up when you deign to think Peter needs you, you’re going to miss all the landmarks in his life that _he_ thinks are important!” 

“I am perfectly capable of ensuring that that _doesn’t happen._ ” 

Holding Loki’s glare with her own level gaze, Pepper leaned back in her chair and let a pause fall after those words. 

Then, with abrupt cheer, she said, “Good! That’s _great._ Peter’s bringing Gwen here for lunch this Tuesday at one o’clock. They have the afternoon off school, so he’s formally introducing her to his parents. Tony put me in charge of arranging it. Don’t be late.” She leaned forward across her desk to hand Loki the card she’d been writing on when he walked in, and it proved to contain the time and location of the lunch. 

Loki took the card, straightening up slowly as he blinked down at it. Then he looked up and stared at the woman before him intently. “Miss Potts, I am the god of chaos. And this is the second time in two days you have roped me into _an appointment. _”__

Pepper smiled and nodded, as if it hadn’t even been hard. It occurred to Loki that this person had spent over twenty years ensuring that Tony Stark was generally where he ought to be at any given time, and it further occurred to him how fearful a notion that was. 

He vanished the card to a safe place without looking away from her. “Have you ever considered a career as deity of thunderstorms and cosmic order? I’d happily seek to render the position vacant for you.” 

Pepper pressed her lips together with a cautious frown, not at all trusting that Loki spoke in jest. “Well, _I like_ Thor. But thank you for the offer.” 

.:.

“Have you seen my phone?” Peter asked, digging through his backpack as he walked. He was with Gwen, the two making their way through the entrance lobby of Stark Tower to eat lunch with his parents as promised. 

“No. You’ve probably got it on you, though. I’ll call it,” Gwen suggested, and pulled out her own cell phone. “Miss Potts said Loki is going to be there. Is that really true?” 

“Guess so,” Peter said. Really, he would believe that when he saw it. Loki had disappeared out of his life without explanation for ten years. He wasn’t going to set his hopes on his mother continuing to reappear now; there was no real reason for him to trust that. 

“Have you lost something?” the woman at the reception desk asked him as they passed. 

Peter stopped and blinked dumbly at her. 

“Have you lost something?” the dark-haired woman repeated more slowly, but in precisely the same tone. “I can call to see if the cleaning crews have picked up any misplaced items.” 

“Oh! Right. Uh…” Peter was interrupted when an out-of-the-way pocket of his backpack started ringing in response to Gwen’s call. “Nope. I got it. Thanks.” 

Gwen ended the call, Peter tossed his girlfriend a grateful smile, and they walked on. 

The elevator took them up a great many floors, and Jarvis directed them to a nice little dining room high up in the building. Tony and Loki stood side-by-side, and looks of relief crossed both their faces when the teenagers walked in, indicating that Peter and Gwen made for a welcome change from whatever conversation or silence had preceded the interruption. 

Tony spread his arms in invitation. “Ah! Kids! C’mon in. Welcome to my humble abode.” 

Loki nodded a greeting and said by way of an aside to Tony, “I see your definition of ‘humility’ hasn’t changed, at least.” 

Peter stepped up to hug Tony and then, much more awkwardly, Loki. Now that the god _had_ shown up, he was starting to wonder if Loki _might_ really stay in town, stay in his life, might be around for a while yet. Part of him wanted to trust this after all, and that was scary. Being held by his mother yet again felt… good, but also dissonant with all the anger he’d pushed aside earlier, when he’d been all too aware of how easily he could lose this, when there had been more important things to express. 

He grimaced a little as he patted Loki’s back and pulled away. 

Next to him, Gwen was warmly shaking hands with Tony. “Mr. Stark.” 

“Miss Stacy.” 

“You learned my _name._ ” She sounded pleased by the development, but there was edge somewhere in her tone. 

Tony shrugged. “Seemed about time. I mean, you’ve only been interning here…” 

“Two years?” she supplied helpfully. 

“Right, and we worked together on… a _few_ projects -- ?” 

“Twenty-one projects,” Gwen informed him. 

Tony’s smile faltered a little. “Uh-huh.” 

“Well, then.” Loki, smiling slightly at Tony’s discomfort, gestured toward a wall that was entirely glass and window frame, where a small dining table was set with plates of… some kind of fancy looking meat that was probably poultry, and Peter was quietly glad it wasn’t fish this time. Fish had a _knack_ to it. “Shall we?” 

Tony took a detour to a nearby counter that held glasses and few large bottles. “Drinks? We’ve got water and cherry ginger ale.” 

While Tony ascertained everyone’s beverage preference, Peter and Gwen settled together on one side of the table, leaving the adults to sit side-by-side as well, Loki settling opposite Peter. 

Tony took the window seat across from Gwen, placing water glasses in front of Loki and Peter, and setting down two bubbly pink sodas for himself and the young woman opposite him. “Dig in, everyone,” he commanded, and they complied. The mystery food was soon revealed to Peter to be duck with pear sauce, grilled young potatoes and red pepper cauliflower. 

“I think I recognize the caterer,” Gwen noted with approval, causing Peter to feel a little more like a member of the unwashed masses. There was a minute of silence to appreciate just how good the food was ( _very_ good) before anyone bothered with conversation. 

Once the lull started to feel like a lull, Tony caught Loki’s eye and jerked his head a bit toward Peter a bit in a _go on_ sort of motion. 

Loki replied with a wry, condescending look that roughly translated to _Oh please,_ but he took a cue to start a conversation. “So, Peter. How is May?” 

Peter put down his fork and tilted his head a little incredulously. “Seriously, Mom? _That’s_ what you’re gonna… Okay: one? _Her husband died._ Two? You’re back in town, so _why_ have you not talked to _her_? She’s your friend, right?” 

Loki leaned back slowly, not quite frowning as he absorbed and considered the resentment in Peter’s words. He shot Tony a brief look that rescinded his earlier confidence and replaced it with panic, and Tony bit his lip, clearly trying not to laugh. No help there. 

Clearing his expression, Loki returned his eyes to Peter and just spoke a soft, “Of course,” yielding the point and falling back into silence. 

Peter didn’t feel better at all for seeing Loki withdraw. “That’s not a real answer. Admitting that you’re wrong doesn’t fix the fact that you’ve been _gone._ ” Peter realised this probably wasn’t the time or the place for a tantrum, and tried to calm down. “I lost you. For _ten years,_ ” he pressed on, hearing in his own voice that he hadn’t really calmed down much. “Why were you gone? All this time, why were you _always_ gone?” 

“To keep you safe.” Loki quietly repeated the reason he’d already given. 

“ _Why else_?!” the teenager persisted. 

Loki glanced around the table and found a similar question in the eyes of everyone there. Damn Pepper. He had known this was a trap. 

The god bit his upper lip, mulling through bitter thoughts and aware of all eyes on him. When he spoke his tone was a bit hollow, working to detach himself from the shame in his words and not quite succeeding. “Sometimes I was distracted. I wound myself up in schemes and time passed more quickly than I knew. And sometimes I was afraid to return, because you would have grown old enough to look on me without the forgiving eyes of a child.” 

Peter crossed his arms. “That was a lot of it, wasn’t it?” 

Loki opened his mouth to deny that. 

“No! _Think about it,_ then answer me.” 

Loki frowned slowly, examining the skyline out the window as he considered once again. “...Moreso as the years passed,” he acknowledged quietly. 

Peter nodded. “Yeah, I figured. Has staying away all this time even really done _anything_ to keep me safe?” 

“ _Yes_ ,” Loki said, eyes snapping back to Peter, the word flat as cut slate. 

Startled by his sureness, Peter scratched his head in an agitated gesture that was almost sheepish. “...Oh.” 

“A great deal,” Loki added. “I never lied to you when I told you my world was unsafe. If you were _ever_ discovered, you would certainly have been used against me. That holds true still.” 

“Doom said something about that,” Gwen recalled. 

Loki narrowed his eyes at her, silently requesting that she choose her words very carefully. 

“A-about tracking down people Loki knows,” Gwen covered. “About wanting to use his friends as leverage to control him.” She was careful not to mention the other children whose existence Loki had scoffed when he’d talked to Killian, courteously letting hidden things stay hidden and beyond her knowledge. 

“Okay, I believe you,” Peter said to Loki, relenting, but there was only a little forgiveness in his voice. 

A collective deep breath rolled around the table as they all quietly re-settled. Tony took a sip of ginger ale, and when it became clear that no one else intended to speak, he put down his glass decisively and changed the topic. “So. Miss Stacy. What are your intentions toward my son?” 

“Oh.” Gwen considered, then shrugged. “I’m after his money, actually,” she said lightly, earning a few relieved smiles as the conversation turned less weighty. 

“Really?” Tony’s eyes twinkled a bit. “And what would you do with all those millions?” 

Gwen tilted her head up thoughtfully. “I’ve always wanted to live in a chocolate house.” 

Peter snorted. 

“Like the one the prince bought in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory?” Loki inquired. 

Gwen nodded. “Yup.” 

Tony leaned in toward her, suddenly intent and deadly curious. “ _How do you propose to solve the melting problem_?” 

“Um…” Gwen blinked, but recovered quickly. “I intend to take into account the first three laws of real estate.” 

Tony straightened up. “Brr.” 

“The real problem is the cocoa butter,” Peter pointed out. “Tempered chocolate doesn’t usually melt when you touch it for a short time, so beta crystals are the most obvious option, but there might be a few substances we could mix in to get the melting point up past eighty-eight degrees…” 

“Peter, how much have you thought about this?” Gwen asked flatly. 

“Well, you… mentioned it before,” he explained. 

“I was joking.” 

“I know.” 

“All the best ideas start out as jokes,” Tony insisted. “One time, I almost invented a stable wormhole…” His gaze turned inward and troubled. “Wait, why did I never finish that project?” 

Loki fielded this one. “If you’ll recall, our first date was largely a bribe to keep you from tearing the universe apart.” 

Tony did recall, now he mentioned it. He was recalling a lot, and Loki was comfortably tracing a finger around the rim of his glass and looking at Tony with smug green eyes that held just as many secrets now as they had then, and Tony recalled all too well the desire to prove to Loki just how reckless he could be if the situation required. “I _was_ going to be careful,” he argued, meeting Loki’s eyes. Then, with a shrug, “Y’know. Unless being careful didn’t work.” 

Peter gave his father a dubious look. “So, when you say you almost invented a _stable _wormhole…”__

“I checked his diagrams,” said Loki. “The most likely outcome would have been a fast-expanding bridge into a universe without bacon.” 

Tony rolled his eyes at that. “Oh come on, it was an early draft! I _knew_ that model needed tweaking.” 

Gwen was looking at Loki with wide, curious eyes. “Are you saying there’s a multiverse with parallel realities? Like, there’s really a universe that’s just like ours, but has no bacon?” 

“No, actually,” Loki admitted, carefully picking out a bite of duck and potato on his plate. “Most universes are devoid of matter. I specified bacon to impress on Tony how _awful_ that would _be_ ,” he explained, before placing his forkful of food in his mouth with an air of delicate finality. 

Tony raised one eyebrow and tossed Loki a leer thick with smarm. “Oh, Sugarpie, you don’t need bacon to impress me.” 

Loki choked abruptly at the epithet, but composed himself seamlessly a moment later. 

Gwen was stifling a laugh behind her hand, and when she could recover a straight face, she looked at the two curiously, and inquired. “So, are you two… together now?” 

The teasing mood gave way to an uncomfortable pause. Tony dabbed his napkin at his lips for something to do, and Gwen winced at having created the quiet. 

“...Not anymore,” said Tony at last, at the same time as Loki said, “Not yet.” 

Then came another silence, in which both men visibly processed the words that had overlapped their own. 

The inventor gave his ex a dumbfounded gape. “ _Run that by me again_?” 

Gwen waved her arms in a slightly frantic motion as if to erase the whole conversation. “Sorry, forget I asked.” 

“ _No_ ,” Tony said stubbornly, still facing Loki. “No, I want to know _what exactly_ you just said.” 

Loki didn’t look at Tony, opting instead to ensure his napkin was perfectly arranged next to his plate. “I said, ‘Not yet,’” he repeated, tone a bit acerbic, as if he found Tony unforgivably hard of hearing, and the god went to take a sip from his water glass, motion full of dismissive elegance. 

“So why _not_ yet?” Tony asked readily. 

Loki blinked and looked to him, stunned. He frowned at the inventor, and his eyes darkened with a hint of the bitterness they’d held when Tony had stopped kissing him in the lab. Almost too quiet to hear, the trickster replied, “I could ask you the same.” 

Tony shook his head and said flatly, “No, you really, _really_ couldn’t.” 

“And why couldn’t I?” 

The mortal opened his mouth to answer, then he closed it, and just _looked_ at Loki through narrowed eyes. Tony was a person who rarely implemented a conspicuous silence, and that seemed to make it more effective, as Loki watched him in turn and grew visibly more uncomfortable with the obvious unfairness of his own words. 

“...This conversation isn’t why we’re here,” Loki pointed out. 

Tony recalled their audience, and looked across the table to find two teenagers watching his love life unfold with rapt, slightly horrified fascination. “Right. Yeah.” 

A little smug at a deflection well accomplished, Loki shifted his chair to angle himself minutely more forward. “We are here to better make the acquaintance of this young lady, with whom our son has fallen in love.” Loki turned toward Peter and continued in a pointed tone, “And in whom he has so… _trustingly_ … confided every aspect of his life.” 

Peter sagged and rolled his eyes in an _I’ve heard this lecture enough times_ motion. “Mo- _om_.” 

Gwen shrugged at Loki. “I know, right? Why didn’t Peter just... lie to me all the time? Pretend to be someone _completely different_ around me?” She widened her eyes mock-innocently. “I can’t see how that could have... ended badly. At all.” 

Loki glared at her briefly, then offered up a nod of acknowledgement. “Touche,” he granted, and there was actually a bit of warmth in it. 

Relieved that her words hadn’t angered him, Gwen smiled back a bit shyly. 

Peter propped an elbow on the table and rested his head against his fist to watch her smile, content and transfixed. 

She caught Peter staring at her and mouthed, _What?_ at him, and Peter just shook his head and didn’t stop staring. 

With a flat look, Loki said, “Peter, if you don’t stop impersonating a love-struck puppy, your face is going to get st-” 

The lights in the room flickered and went out. 

Loki frowned up at the fixtures. “Now that is odd.” 

“That’s really not supposed to happen,” Tony complained. “Like, _really_. Jarvis?” 

No answer. 

Peter straightened up and looked around at a room suddenly full of new shadows, sharing Tony’s concern. “Since when can the _lack_ of a disembodied voice be this creepy?” 

Gwen had pulled out her cell phone and was trying futilely to turn it on. “I think there must have been an EM pulse. My phone’s dead.” 

“Mine too,” Tony confirmed a second later. 

“Explosion?” Peter questioned. 

Loki looked dubious. “Not all that smokes is fire. Check out the window.” 

“Right.” Tony leaned over and squinted down through the window. “Looks like all the cars are still running down there. Between electric auto components and folks who are lost without GPS’s and green lights, that traffic’s too good for a large-scale EMP. Whatever this was, it’s local.” 

Peter sighed in relief. 

“That probably means it came from inside the building, right?” Gwen reasoned. 

Standing, Tony walked away from the window toward the door. “Very possible. Loki, got any handy spells?” Before Loki could answer, he opened the door to the hallway and shouted at the top of his lungs, “SECURITY! YEAH, YOU! OVER HERE!” and then looked to Loki for a reply while he waited for tower staff to arrive. 

“I can’t revive your tower on short notice, if that’s what you mean.” 

Tony shot an annoyed look at the smug, pretty bastard sitting at his table and being unhelpful. “I _mean_ , I’m open to suggestions.” 

“Is your arc reactor okay?” Gwen thought to ask. 

“Should be hardened against--” Tony tugged at the neck of his shirt to glance down at it and interrupted himself to finish, “Still glowing.” 

A woman with a security badge appeared outside the door, less winded than one would expect after jogging to meet her boss’s summons. “Mr. Stark, there’s been some sort of electrical-” 

“Yeah, yeah. Noticed. Do you know how far it went?” 

“The lights came on after a second in the north side of the tower.” She sounded impressively calm about the whole thing. “Would you like me to go look for more help?” 

“No, just stay here until we’ve thought this out a little more.” Tony rubbed his chin thoughtfully and started pacing. “North side of the tower. Small radius, then. _Really_ small, assuming this was a targeted attack and not an R &D accident. It must have been focused on the south…” He trailed off, and then breathed in horror, “ _My lab_ ,” and took off running past the guard. 

Loki quickly took stock of the room around him and turned to his son. “Peter, go with Tony. Make sure he doesn’t get himself killed.” 

“Right.” Peter nodded and started after his father at a sprint. 

Next, the trickster went to the window and started examining it, finding an emergency latch along one side that allowed a pane of glass to slide away, light and shadows shifting across the dining room with the motion of the window. “I’m going to fly down and see if I can’t catch any possible saboteurs leaving. Miss Stacy, stay here with tower security.” 

“Okay.” Gwen started walking toward the security guard, then frowned at the woman as her eyes adjusted enough to see her face clearly. “Wait. Weren’t you working reception earlier today?” 

Loki stilled halfway through opening the window, and turned slowly in place to fix a contemplative stare at the woman in the doorway. “I wasn’t aware Stark’s security personnel doubled as receptionists.” 

The woman shrugged, and unembellished rise and fall of her shoulders. “We do.” 

“ _That_ is a _lie_ ,” Loki noticed with a dawning smile, entirely pleased. “But, it’s not _quite_ a lie, is it?” he added, closing the window and stepping closer to the woman with a muted, contemplative glee. “There’s something off about how the intentions echo through. If you please, could you claim that the sky is green?” 

The woman frowned. “I don’t see where you’re going with this.” 

“That untruth works just as well, thank you.” Loki was quiet for a moment, running back through the sound of her words in his mind. “I thought so. You’re not exactly _sentient._ Hold out your hand.” 

Instead of obeying, the woman stepped back and tried to break into a run, but didn’t have time before Loki moved forward quick as a whip and took hold of her arm, pulling her fully into the room. 

“Don’t worry,” Loki assured her as he took hold of one of her fingers and bent it back. “If I’m right, this won’t hurt.” 

“Wait, what if you’re wrong?” Gwen questioned, and both women winced forward to stop Loki as he snapped the guard woman's finger clean off. No screams or blood accompanied the action; just the sound of a sharp metallic crack and the buzz and flash of a small spark. It quickly became plain that it was not, in fact, a human finger. 

“Android?” Gwen questioned. 

“Just so,” Loki mused, examining the proximal end of the detached digit. The glint of machinery inhabited a space that ought to have been tendon and knuckle. He looked up appreciatively at the machine, which grimaced back at him, still held in place by his hand around her forearm. “Oh, Doom must have worked on you for months, if not _years_. This is delicate work. The AI alone is impressive. Nothing like Jarvis, of course,” Loki added as an aside to Gwen. “Jarvis can really properly _lie_. But this isn’t bad.” 

Speaking again to the android, he went on, “You don’t approach even a _human’s_ structural integrity to hold up in battle, but as a _spy_ … or a saboteur? You planted the EM pulse, didn’t you?” 

“I really don’t know what you’re talking about,” the machine insisted, but the tone of this last denial echoed an earlier one too perfectly, voice becoming repetitive. It made her sound flat, the range of her vocal emotions apparently not designed to last beyond about ten minutes of Turing test. 

Loki spoke a word and a gesture, and the android stilled, expression falling slack. 

“You’re not going to ask her anything else?” Gwen questioned. “She might know something useful.” 

“And it might have a self-destruct sequence for situations like this,” Loki pointed out. He frowned at the humanoid form of the thing with continued focus and curiosity. “The magic woven around it is informative enough, inasmuch as I can parse it.” 

Gwen shrugged and went to the window to watch the traffic, watching for any unusual backup to indicate that another EM pulse might have gone off elsewhere in the city since Tony looked, and finding none. 

It wasn’t long before the inventor returned with Gwen’s boyfriend in tow, and immediately filled up the quiet room with words. “Alright, folks. The good news is, the doors are still locked up there. There were burn marks and small directed explosive casings, so I think someone tried them and couldn’t get in. The bad news is, whoever it was planted this right outside the door.” Tony held up a square metal device in his hand, apparently responsible for the EM pulse. “Took out some of my projects, and I’m pretty sure the coffee maker in there is fried past fixing.The good news is, I keep all my important files either backed up off-site or in computer equipment hardened against this sort of thing, so I can recover everything that I remembered to back up. The bad news is, I can’t summon my suits right now, because I don’t have a phone and the power’s out up here. Somebody tell me I don’t need my suits right now.” 

“You don’t need them quite yet,” Loki informed him. 

“Good.” Tony frowned. “Bad. Why not _quite_ yet? How come you know more than I do when you’ve just been standing here the whole time?” 

Gwen explained. “The guardwoman is an android. Loki says she works for Doom and she… set the EM pulse? Is that right?” 

Peter stared at the guardwoman. “How could something hardened against an EM pulse have the processing power to run an AI?” 

“Magic,” Loki said simply. 

“Magic,” Tony muttered, apparently exasperated with the whole concept. “How did I know you were going to say that?” 

Loki ignored him and went on, “It’s covered in shielding that’s protected it from the EM burst. I think some of its processing and information storage also falls more in the realm of magic than earth technology.” 

“Doom sent a whole fancy robot just to plant a bomb in my house? There _should_ be way easier ways to do that.” Tony paused to consider. “Shouldn’t there?” 

“Good question. But if the EM pulse was secondary…” Loki cast searching eyes on the android again, unclipped a key chain from her belt, and selected a thumb drive from among the items attached, which he then handed to Tony. “This was protected by the same shield that preserved her circuitry. I imagine you’ll find some sensitive information regarding your company’s research and development programs stored on this.” 

Tony took the drive and pocketed it. “This is still _weird,_ though. Why not just hack our servers?” 

Peter shook his head. “Naw, I’ve tried hacking Stark Industries. It doesn’t work, but sneaking in and poking around isn’t that hard. Only took me one day to find the spiders. Another try and I probably could have gotten into the systems. Just needed to find a computer interface someone had logged into.” 

Tony heaved a wistful sigh. “So much for the human element in human resources.” 

Loki tilted his head to one side, a ghost of a shrug. “Well, if you hired robots, Doom’s craftsmanship would only blend in more easily. I have a plan, by the way,” he added, cunning and sure. 

Tony’s mind filled up all sorts of inappropriate suggestions about what that plan should involve -- ( _Loki_ ) ( _himself_ ) ( _a flat surface _) -- but quashed them all and just said, “Hnm?” in what he hoped was a calm, questioning tone.__

“I may be able to turn this thing against its master. If I alter the magical structure of its intelligence, it could very well willingly tell us Doom’s current location.” 

“Is that ethical?” Tony asked uneasily. 

Loki gave him a look. 

“I’m serious!” 

“So I assumed. I’m just surprised that you think _I_ of all people would know the answer. I’m not known for my expertise in _ethical behavior._ ” 

“Okay. Well.” Tony held up a hand and swept it forward eloquently. “Is she sentient?” 

“No.” 

“If she was, would you lie about it to get me to agree to an unethical plan?” 

“Yes,” Loki said obviously, then huffed and rolled his eyes. “If I make her forget that she’s been caught, and we follow her back to the master who bade her infiltrate your castle, will that satisfy your code?” 

“I guess that’ll do. How long will it take?” 

“No more than fifteen minutes, if I can do it at all. It’s simpler than trying to rewrite the thing’s priorities would be, actually,” Loki realized aloud. 

Tony nodded, adding it all up and inwardly putting together a plan of action. “You do your spooky stuff. I’ll track down a working phone and tell Avengers to suit up and wait in the wings when we follow her out. See if she takes us anywhere interesting. Miss Stacy, if you’ll come with me, I can lead you to some _actual_ security personnel who can keep you safe until this blows over.” He paused and looked at her carefully. “You’re not any kind of superhero, are you? Any magic powers or secret identities?” 

“Not that I’ve noticed,” Gwen shrugged. 

“Right, yeah, civilian treatment it is then. Follow me.” 

The two exited, and Peter was left alone with Loki and the impassive android. Most of Loki’s focus had turned to the machine, examining its mechanical and magical properties. Without looking away from it, he pulled a marker out of his pocket and handed it absently to his son. “Peter, do you remember how to draw a proper pentagram?” 

The teenager took the marker slowly, and a lot of memories came flooding back. Because he’d never had any magical abilities, but Loki had certainly bothered to _check_ by teaching him a few spells he’d later forgotten for lack of use, and now he was vividly aware of what the tiles on their kitchen floor had looked like when he was six years old and Loki was showing him the geometrical patterns that tended to make up the foundations of earthly magic. 

“Peter?” 

He snapped to attention and searched for an answer. “Uh… Maybe. I’ll try, and you let me know if I mess up, okay?” Just like they’d always done it. 

Loki took his eyes off the android to toss Peter a quick, gentle smile. “You do that.” 

Peter squatted and started drawing on the floor, a flat tile surface a bit like the one he was remembering. He managed to draw a pentagram embellished with all the basic magical fixings with, according to Loki, only a few minor errors, which he figured was pretty good for someone eleven years out of practice, and his mother seemed to agree. 

It took about ten minutes of strange chants and arcane gestures, but Loki ended the spell with a look of satisfaction. 

“It worked?” Peter questioned. 

“Yes, it worked,” Loki confirmed and went to open the door. 

Tony was already waiting in the hall, this time braceleted in the older model homing devices that would allow him to summon an iron man suit without working implants. “It worked?” he asked, unknowingly echoing Peter. 

Seeing two nods of affirmation, he reported on his own progress. “The Avengers are on call and I’ve got suits and Jarvis operational on the lower floors. Everything’s set up, so we can leave as soon as you can think of a good way to follow Doom’s lovebot over there without catching her attention once you wake her up.” 

Loki shot him a stern glance. 

Tony winced. “I’m being misogynistic again with the ‘lovebot’ crack, aren’t I?” 

“At least this time you weren’t trying for ‘romantic.’ We’re ready as well.” Loki motioned simply with his hand, and his own armor flickered into existence, helmetless, and cut slim to his form. Today he was dressed more for maneuverability than for a dramatic entrance, wrapped in woven green and black and glinting metal and generally a little more deadly than usual. 

“Oh, hey, also, I have comms.” Tony inwardly shook himself and stepped up to Loki and Peter, handing them each a small headset and fixing a third into his own left ear. “Calling in the cavalry might be hard without those. That’s assuming we have a plan to be the not-cavalry. Still waiting to hear how we’re going to manage that?” 

“It won’t be difficult.” Loki accepted and donned the gadget. “You’re both familiar with my invisibility spell and its limitations?” 

Peter said, “Yup.” 

Tony said, “Um.” 

Because holding hands with Loki. And focusing on other things. Those were kind of mutually exclusive tasks. For him. These days. 

Loki smiled a little too slowly, but took pity on him. “Peter, perhaps you should walk in the middle. That will leave me one hand free to cast if I need it.” 

“Okay.” Peter reached over to interlock his fingers with Tony’s, and waited. 

The god led the android out into the hallway and spoke a final, “Lead us to your master, Madam Golem,” to it before stepping back into the room and taking Peter’s hand. 

.:.

“She’s late,” Killian complained to Doom as they waited in an alley a few blocks from Stark Tower for the magician’s spy to return with the thumb drive and whatever stolen information it might now contain. 

“Go, if you haven't the patience for this,” Doom advised. “There was no need to come with me tonight... unless you need assurance that I will share whatever information I acquire.” 

Killian tried for an amused smile and ended up somewhere closer to _annoyed grimace_. “Not at all. I’m just eager to know if this minion of yours was successful.” 

Doom turned to look at him, but the mask was inevitably expressionless. “Of course.” 

The android finally walked around the corner and into sight, and Doom immediately stepped forward to pick up her broken hand and examine it. “Jill. You’ve been damaged. How?” 

The android frowned down at her hand, surprised. “I don’t remember.” 

Doom released her hand and looked out at the street. There was nothing there to be seen, but still he concluded, “This is a trap.” He ran out into the street with Killian and the android close behind. There seemed to be only normal traffic and a few civilian pedestrians who immediately started walking the other way when Doom made his appearance, but in the sky a glint of metallic red could be seen flying toward them from the direction of Stark Tower. 

“We have time yet to leave before Iron Man arrives,” Doom surmised. “Killian, you should go. Once I have removed any tracking device they may have placed on Jill, I will share with you what information she might have found.” 

“You know, Killian,” said Loki behind them, “I very much doubt your friend will be able to follow through on that promise.” 

The two villains looked to the source of the voice and found that the trickster had snatched away the android and now stood about four yards away. Jill stood behind him, staring off into space with the air of a computer playing its screensaver. Spider-Man and Tony Stark stood to either side, the latter keeping half an eye on the Iron Man suit as it approached. 

“What have you done to Doom’s most prized android?” Doom demanded. 

Killian just shook his head at Loki and said, “Why is it _always_ you?” 

Tony scratched his chin thoughtfully. “Yeah, that has to be weird, I mean, another supervillain messing up all your plans for no apparent reason. _Okay, nobody tell him_ ,” he urged Loki and Peter in a stage whisper. “Oh, finally!” he added as the suit arrived and with a gust of wind and a variety of electrical and mechanical noises, the armor swiftly moved to engulf him. 

He stepped up to let the soles of his boots unfold into place last, and set the two repulsors at his palms to charge, pointed directly at his opponents. “Also, you two might just want to surrender right now.” 

Doom laughed. 

Spider-Man’s shoulders dropped in annoyed dismay. “Shit, that’s a there’s-something-we-don’t-know laugh.” 

“Look behind you,” Loki advised, carefully keeping his own eyes on Killian and Doom. 

Tony and Peter turned around and made sounds of dismay as over a dozen Doombots crowded into the street. 

Killian looked too, pressed his eyes closed in irritation, and addressed his ally. “Dare I ask why there were twenty of your robots waiting around the next corner for a rendezvous that was meant to be between you and me and one artificial spy?” 

“Simply insurance in case you chose to take advantage of the circumstances.” 

“Right. Perfect.” And then, “Even better,” as Thor came flying in not long after Tony’s suit and landed half-kneeling next to his fellow Avenger, the deep red of his cape pooling around him on the asphalt. 

“That’s two gods on our side now,” Iron Man tallied. “And your toasters aren’t exactly close enough to protect you, Victor. You might just want to put your hands up.” 

Doom lifted his hands in a show of surrender. “I think you would regret arresting us now. After all, what would my Doombots do, left to their own devices on a crowded street?" In illustration, the robots broke ranks and advanced ominously toward specific cars and still-fleeing pedestrians. 

Seeing the images come up on his HUD, Tony sighed and lowered his repulsors. “He’s right. First thing we’ve gotta do is get this street completely clear of civilians.” He took off toward the crowd of Doombots and started shouting out orders to the policemen helping to evacuate and block off the area, firing off a few repulsor shots where necessary to prevent outright attack. 

A SHIELD car pulled up on the opposite side of the street and the remaining four Avengers stepped out, everyone suited up but Bruce, who glanced uncomfortably around at the civilians still cluttering the street. 

Loki, Peter and Thor still stood facing Killian and Doom. “You fight with us then, Loki?” Thor asked without looking at his brother. 

“I fight _against_ my own enemies,” Loki corrected pointedly. “If you wish to help, I suppose I can’t stop you. Now, the thing behind me that appears to be a woman is an android created by Doom, and he rather badly wants it back. I recommend you relocate it into that car while we two keep the rest of his creations from causing too much mayhem. Spider-Man, if you’ll join me.” And he started briskly toward the horde of robots without waiting to learn what the thunderer thought of his orders. 

Thor took a moment to stare after Loki, trying to discern if following his lead really was wise just now. Ultimately, he took Jill by the arm and led her toward the SHIELD vehicle. 

Natasha and Steve started past him toward Doom and Killian, but were halted when two humanoid figures leapt out from behind a stopped car to attack them. 

The two Avengers ducked bullets and blows and gave the same in turn until their attackers staggered away with skin glowing orange-hot, whole again seconds after taking half-deadly blows. Once healed, they ran to Killian and took positions guarding him as several more Extremis subjects appeared out of the woodwork and took what openings they could to attack the soldier and the assassin. 

“Dare I ask?” Doom inquired of the other doctor over the rising clamor of blows and crunching metal. 

Killian tilted his head philosophically. “Well, I suppose it’s true that great minds think alike. My guards only followed along as insurance in case you chose to betray me, of course.” 

“Of course,” Doom said again. He looked over the lay of the land. “This will require cunning. Even outnumbered, the Avengers will soon have the advantage.” 

“Well, that’s my cue.” And Killian turned and started to walk away, flanked by two of his goons. 

Surprised and angered by this development, Doom spun to see him leave, cape whirling dramatically with the motion. “Killian, you have a chance now to fight by my side and truly gain my favor!” 

The scientist turned and kept walking backwards. “I’ve been weighing the pros and cons of that, and it doesn’t look good.” 

“ _Coward._ ” 

Killian’s nostrils flared. “Frankly, this is not my problem! This whole infiltration was _your_ idea, and it was _your_ undercooked AI who got us discovered!” 

“That android represents years of work. If you wish to preserve our alliance, _you will stay and fight with me_.” 

“You know, at this point, that is a pretty big _if,_ ” Killian concluded, and turned his back again. 

.:.

“Looks like they’re having some kind of disagreement,” Natasha observed over the comms. “Bruce, we’re about ready for your other half. I count thirty-six hostiles, but good bet there’s more waiting to make an appearance.” 

The Captain’s voice came on next. “Alright, keep an eye out, everyone. First few minutes will be the hardest while the numbers even out.” 

Loki gripped his son’s shoulder. “You _did_ watch the recorded briefings on Doom’s battle tactics, didn’t you?” 

“Yes, mother,” Peter replied, tone dutiful and ironic both. 

“Good.” The god pulled Peter’s head to him and briefly kissed his masked brow. “I’ll watch out for you where I can. Be safe.” 

The Doombots moved to attack in earnest, and all extraneous conversation gave way to the blur and the sharp immediacy of combat, everyone running on instinct and adrenaline as they met combatants numerous enough to outflank them and come in at every angle. 

For Peter, it was flight and thrilling gravities of force as his body changed velocities faster than he could once have survived. It was webs shooting and refracting and catching in calculated fractals and pendulum swings, only for his handholds to be incinerated or magically dispersed moments later, leaving him to quickly reassess his surroundings and think faster than thought just to stay alive. 

He kind of loved that feeling. 

Loki was more accustomed to the rush of adrenaline and reflex-quick thought that came with battle and being outnumbered. He fought primarily in speed and knives and close quarters, throwing out the occasional illusion to confuse an enemy or, at one point, to send an illusory mirror flying through Peter’s line of sight for a split-second glimpse of the scorched once-human closing on the boy from behind. 

Peter gave him a quick thumbs-up in thanks once he’d given his attacker a solid knock to the head. 

Thor’s hammer came barreling through and they both dodged aside. Peter spun one robot unawares into its path, and then they simply watched as a row of Doombots and Extremis subjects fell to the unfair simplicity of blunt force. The two exchanged a look, and Loki’s was a rather winded version of, _now you see what I’ve had to live with._

“Killian’s running,” Steve informed everyone through the comms. “Looks like the Extremis guys are just covering his escape. Can anyone cut him off at the intersection with 3rd?” 

“I’m on it! I am _not_ on it. SHI-” Tony’s voice cut off mid-expletive as another Extremis subject jumped out the window of a nearby building where it had apparently been lying in wait, tackling Tony in mid-air with force and heat enough to bend metal at angles too sharp to properly house a human body. 

Loki looked up in time to see Iron Man take a hard impact with a building on the opposite side of the street, and the god felt something black and cold splinter through his soul as Tony’s form fell too limply, with too much distance left between himself and the ground, and something too misshapen in how the light caught in the warped surface of his chestpiece. 

The Extremis subject found a handhold and clung to the same wall Tony had crashed into, watching in satisfaction as Iron Man fell. 

No one was close enough to catch him, but Loki spotted a large pickup precisely at the end of Tony’s trajectory, and thought fast as he summoned magic to his hands and raced toward that point. _One thing can turn into another. It’s easy --_

_\-- Like wine into snakes. Something crushed underfoot, the nature of vines, of winding and seeking out. So easy to convince a substance to be something so near in nature to what it remembers. So easy to convince it to be something just a little different, something that can bite back._

_What does a truck want to be? It’s metal and speed, but those won't do, something soft… something that remembers being cotton or soft ground or --_

_\--- or a little plush toy dangling from the rearview mirror that’s been there so long now the truck thinks it’s part of it. Feline and well-loved. But is the toy part of the truck or is the truck part of the toy or -- ?_

\-- There. 

And Loki had made a similar object disappear once. _Something banished to nonexistence that’s waiting to be again, and it’s leaning that way already, in this place, under this person, all in the middle of finding lost things. It only takes a nudge._ Magic. 

A whisper of desperate, arcane words, a flash of light, and Tony landed hard on a gigantic stuffed cat, where an old truck had been parked only moments before. 

He rebounded at a carefully planned angle and Loki caught him with a low “ _Oof,_ ” and skidded back as they both fell to the ground. 

Natasha and Thor executed a toss maneuver that sent her flying overhead, and Black Widow took over where Tony had left off, dodging past deadly hot limbs to exchange lightning-fast blows with Killian’s guard and catch a handhold on a high window ledge. She broke the window and swung into the building in time to take cover from the blast as the explosive she’d planted on her opponent’s body went off and the detonation engulfed a section of the building’s upper wall in flames. 

Well clear of the inferno and away from the bulk of the fighting, Loki set Tony down on a section of sidewalk and knelt next to him, hands hesitating over the human’s form for a moment as he wondered where best to start and what, at worst, he might learn when he did. 

He pulled off the faceplate first, finding a dazed face and a line of blood down Tony’s forehead and cheek that must have dripped from a fresh head wound before he’d fallen. Concussed? Likely. 

The face blinked at him. “Becky?” 

“Yes, it’s Loki,” the god confirmed with a sharp nod. “Keep speaking, Tony. Keep awake and speak to me.” 

“Loki, right,” Tony muttered, and went quiet. 

“Don’t stop talking!” Loki reminded him urgently 

“Um, _Loki_ … you love me, right?” was apparently all the downed hero could think of to say. His breath didn’t seem to come as easy as it should and Loki couldn’t tell yet if he was fully present. 

“ _Yes_ ,” Loki said without hesitation, too concerned with other things to fear the question as he normally would. He worked briskly as they spoke, setting up enchantments and magicking pieces of armor aside bit by bit, wary of how the complex interlocking design had skewed on impact. 

“‘Swhat I _thought._ But you left.” There was a simple bafflement in the words, like one and one had ceased to equal two. Of course, if Tony’s head was sufficiently injured, maybe they had. 

“Yes,” the god repeated less willingly, working to keep the brunt of his focus on the task at hand. They needed to speak, but did they need to speak about _this_ of all things? There was too much red coming to light under the painted shell of metal he was picking apart. 

Tony caught his wrist, stopping him, and met Loki’s eyes with a clear and demanding look, far sharper than Loki had judged his state of mind. “Why?” 

Irritated at being stopped at such a pivotal moment, Loki shoved Tony’s hand aside, letting his ire bleed through past whatever less convenient emotions might keep him mute. “Because I knew losing my secrets and losing you were one and the same. You’ve proven me wrong on that point, _probably_ out of _sheer contrary stubbornness_. At any rate, my secrets would not have kept. You always saw too much. If you’d been a fool, I might have lingered.” 

Tony let his hand fall back to his side and made a rude noise. “Since when am _I_ not a fool?” 

Loki exhaled a harsh breath as he removed Tony’s chestplate and found the shirt beneath was indeed soaked in blood. “Then damn you for being a _clever_ fool. And _me_ for being a coward. I wouldn’t stay and see the look on your face when you learned I was too much a monster and a liar to be worth keeping.” 

“You weren’t willing to risk that for me,” Tony surmised. 

“You’re _temporary_ ,” Loki hissed, annoyed and a little defensive. “One month, one century... I was always going to lose you before I was ready.” 

Tony smiled weakly. “Yeah. But _I_ didn’t have to lose _you._ ” 

Loki had a clear picture of Tony’s wounds now. Deadly without magic, fearful to look at, but he was nearly sure he could heal this. The god pressed his lips together to stop them shaking, pushing back tears of shame and old grief and manic humor as he banished more scraps of armor and pressed down to slow the worst of the bleeding. “You _knew_ I was selfish.” 

Tony squirmed in pain and Loki moved to hold him still. “ _Ow._ Geeze. I guess I thought you might… y’know, _selfishly_ … decide to keep me as long as you could. I guess I thought that was the plan.” He tilted his head up to focus on Loki’s face again and frowned. “That was never the plan, was it, Loki?” 

“No,” Loki agreed flatly. And then not quite flatly, he added, “But it ought to have been.” 

“Can you keep me this time? For a little while?” 

Loki placed a second hand on Tony’s torso, over the worst of the damage he could see. “If I had any say in the matter, I would keep you until the realms fell away.” 

Tony smiled, and it quickly turned into another pained wince. “Get me through this alive and we’ll get started on that. Even if maybe all we do is get started.” 

Loki had spoken too many words too honestly, and now he thought he really might be mute with it for the tightness in his throat, but after a moment he managed, “Agreed.” 

The healing magic started to really take then, and Tony felt his bones grating into place. “Ow, ow, _ow,_ ow...” Torn muscles and ligaments wound together, and his skin itched madly as it scrambled to make itself whole. 

Then it was over. The magic ran out of work to do and slid away, leaving Tony exhausted. 

Loki glanced over him cautiously. “How do you feel?” 

Pain gone, Tony tried to summon the strength to move and the world swam around him with a much less ominous fog than had threatened him before. “Like I need fifty hamburgers and a week of sleep.” 

“Good.” Loki smiled and closed his eyes, keeling down fully as he sagged in relief. 

Tony managed on his second try to heave himself up to a sitting position so he could bury his face in the crook of Loki’s neck. “Good,” he echoed quietly. 

The world faded a bit, and Tony dozed in and out as they sat together there and the battle ended around them. 

The Avengers gathered to make sure Tony was okay. “Only exhausted by a healing spell,” Loki reassured them, and Tony realized that there was a double meaning there because Loki must be exhausted too to have sat out the battle with him. “He should eat and then rest.” 

Tony was being carried and things blurred for a bit more, and then Loki was jostling his shoulder. Tony was sitting on a soft couch and there was some sort of sandwich in front of him, which he dug into with fervor. He noted only bits and pieces of the conversations, tuning in for part of a casual debriefing from Steve (“Yeah, Doom’s been apprehended. He and his android are in SHIELD custody. Killian got away, no one seems to know where”) and losing focus just as quickly when he noticed there were pickles in his sandwich. 

The meal woke him enough that when it ended he heaved himself to his feet, taking Loki’s hand as he went. “Let’s go to bed,” he said, too tired to process and enjoy the shocked reactions of the other Avengers. 

They walked to the elevator and Tony’s awareness faded again, in and out through a blur of walking, magic and a resulting change of clothes, linens and warmth and very deep sleep. 

.:.

Tony woke to a sensation of profound wellbeing, and thus, naturally, resisted any inclination to wake up further. 

But wake up further he did, and the realization that there was someone else in his bed floated slowly to him, abruptly followed by the realization that certain parts of his anatomy already _knew_ that there was someone in his bed, and were overenthusiastic about the fact. 

He shifted, finding himself tangled up with a body of slim, strong limbs and pleasant, firm lines. He could feel the fabric of two pairs of sweatpants between them, but no shirts. The form next to his felt most probably male, which was unusual for him, but not unheard of. More odd that he felt well-rested, as he didn’t usually sleep well with another person in his bed, and the only exceptions to that rule so far had all been very exceptional women. Curious and just beginning to remember the past few days, Tony blinked fully awake. 

He was looking into a pair of familiar and disconcerting green eyes. It hurt how much he wanted those eyes, but all he wanted, really, was to keep looking into them and keep on hurting. Not logical, that. 

Anyway, in real life no one had eyes like that. 

“Do me a favor,” Tony said in a sleep-cracked voice. “Don’t let me wake up.” 

The face that was home to those eyes smiled sadly at him. “Never again,” Loki assured him. 

Tony leaned over toward Loki and slid a hand up the trickster’s neck to rest under his ear. He felt the faint vibrations in his hand when Loki spoke again, soft and wry. “For the record, Tony, you’re awake.” 

Tony smiled indulgently and scooched his head forward on the pillows so his face was only a few inches from Loki’s. “Sure I am. That’s why I’m sharing a bed with a shapeshifting god of chaos. That is _absolutely_ how real life works.” 

Loki rolled up over him, resting his forearms on either side of Tony’s head and letting his face continue to hover close over him, almost nose-to-nose. “Yes, and the course of your life was so probable and ordinary before I came along.” 

“ _Way_ too ordinary,” Tony agreed readily. 

The man above him shot down an amused, dubious look. “You _do_ realize that - ” 

Tony propped himself up on one elbow so he could lean up to kiss the god silent. Loki’s lips were soft and still with surprise, tasting of spice and apples and a little of the bitterness of sleep. Dammit, he’d been wanting to do this every time a word crossed those lips, witticisms and sardonic twists and aggravating denials, all so frustrating, all tugging him closer no matter how unwise it was to follow the pull. 

With a strong hand on his shoulder, Loki pushed him flat to the bed again and kissed him in turn, dominating and consuming and stirring Tony awake in every way. Yes, this was real, no, he wasn’t asleep, and, yes, the man above him was solid and _here_ and resting firmly on top of him. _Finally,_ he thought, as he let himself realize all these things and felt something crack open deep in his chest at the thought, hot and unsolid and meltingly inadvisable. It was was a lit match held to good alcohol, catching and burning, claiming him and bringing him alive all at once. _Just like Rebecca,_ Tony observed in relieved confusion, before reminding himself again that this _was_ Rebecca. She had come back to him, she was _here_ , but he had to learn to call her by an older name and know her by a different shape and assume even less than he had the first time around. 

It was a very nice shape, and Tony got busy knowing it. He ran his hands all over Loki’s body, slower and more exploratory than that day in his lab, finding it longer and firmer than he was used to. Broad shoulder blades, flat planes of chest. Low, inadvertent groans pressed into the kiss in response to Tony’s touch, needy enough when they rose to a tenor pitch as the inventor's hands wandered those slim hips, gripped them measuringly through a layer of soft fabric and then pulled sharply to roll Loki down onto his side so the two lay face-to-face, panting into the broken kiss. 

“Are you going to stop?” Loki asked, breathless but wary, recalling last time. 

“Are you going to leave?” Tony shot back hoarsely, recalling an older last time. 

The god grimaced, then gave him a pointed look. “We’ve been over this.” 

“I’m never going to be over this,” Tony said, eyes following his own hand as it trailed down over the trickster’s bare ribs, speaking of Loki as much as he was speaking of Loki having left. 

The god pressed his hand to Tony’s back and pulled them flush together, their noses really brushing now, the trickster’s eyes boring into Tony’s in a way that was mostly predatory, and only a little bit caught. “Neither am I.” 

Heart beating suddenly faster, Tony jerked forward into the press of their bodies and twisted closer, torso to torso. The effect of so much skin against his shot him back to the smell of warehouse and smoke and the electric touch of Loki’s hand in his, before he’d known who this was, when he hadn’t yet recognized Rebecca in another skin, and the force of attraction Loki inspired had seemed so out of place. Good and paralyzing and strange. 

Now it washed through him from every texture and shape of Loki’s form against his chest and arms and fingers, a wave of old and new curiosities, shifting across his skin like a magnetic field, a hair-raising, all-encompassing pull. He wanted to take Loki apart, find all those new tones in his voice that had been scraping through Tony so deliciously every time the man spoke, rougher and deeper than the voice he knew. He wanted to memorize and own the sound of them, learn to play this new body like the rare and exquisite instrument it was. 

And there was something deeply satisfying about wanting something that was so close for the taking. 

He pushed at the bed, rolling them a bit further so he was lying partially on Loki, the top of his head briefly propped against the other man’s pillow as he kissed his way lingeringly from Loki’s shoulder to his neck, listening for the spots that made the trickster’s breathing go unsteady. The old point on Loki’s collarbone got him the same reaction as always, and just remembering what Becky had always liked, Tony had his partner gasping and swearing and squirming against him soon enough. 

Uttering a particularly savage obscenity, Loki rolled them again, pinned Tony flat on his back, and started licking his way down from the hollow between Tony’s collarbones. He ran one thumb over a bit of scar tissue around Tony’s arc reactor, back and forth, a familiar, ever-so-light touch Loki had perfected in their time together years ago to tease sensitivity from the ordinarily unresponsive skin. 

By the time the trickster’s mouth arrived to trace along the same path, the wetness and heat was enough make Tony’s mind stutter to a halt, and he started muttering wrecked nonsense long before Loki had even touched him anywhere particularly scandalous. “Lo… yea… the-that’s… oh, _fuck_ me…” 

The god paused and made a contemplative sound. “Now _that_ is something I’ve never properly had the chance to do.” 

Still caught in a haze, Tony couldn’t actually remember what he’d just said to prompt Loki’s reply. “Eh?” 

Loki lifted his head to meet Tony’s gaze. “ _Fucking you,_ ” he clarified, enunciating the words clearly with a dark grin that made Tony’s hair stand on end in all the right ways. 

The inventor’s eyes widened. “ _Yes_ , that is a thing we can now do. _Right_ now. This is so happening. Yup.” 

Still grinning, Loki lowered his head and returned to his earlier exploration, making his way south along the midline of Tony’s abs, one hand wandering down under Tony’s pants to slide them off over his hips, halting at mid thigh to run upward again, pulling up at the section of leg just under Tony's ass to make said ass more accessible, and Loki’s back arched up with the motion of the maneuvering, keeping his torso far enough elevated to leave generous space for Tony’s very hard cock to go conspicuously untouched, and Tony groaned in disapointed complaint, a sound that went accidentally higher as Loki teased the skin low on his belly with moving lips and damp breath and low words, syllables of spellwork to whisper slick onto his fingers. 

One of those fingers started to press into him, and Tony was left to breathe and relax into the stretch of it and meditate on things familiar and things not. Familiar: Becky’s fingers inside him, prodding expertly deeper until they found the spot that made him jerk and whimper in an embarrassingly needy way that he tried to stifle. Familiar: those two piercing green eyes that glanced up in triumph when she… _he_ started to exploit the confirmed knowledge of exactly where that spot was, making Tony’s world narrow to the width of a single fingertip, to the play of callus and fingernail and soft skin pressing hard circles into him with crushing, perfect accuracy. 

Not familiar: those same fingers slowly stretching him open, adding finger after finger to maintain a balance of aching burn and patient time and gentle pressure, easing him through it. Not familiar, the flash of nerves that sliced through Tony’s gut when Loki deemed him ready and all those fingers slid away. 

Tossing aside what little of the covers remained over them that might tangle and get in his way, Loki rolled up nearly to a sitting position to strip off his own pants in one quick motion, then finished undressing Tony with a similar intent impatience, and pulled up his legs and bolstered his hips with adept efficiency. The eager way Loki’s eyes roamed his body as he worked made the inventor momentarily sure that a gaze could be hot enough to leave scars. 

While he was maneuvered further into place, Tony took a belated second to wonder if this was actually a good idea. It was really soon. They’d barely made up, and here he was stepping into the same trap twice, and none too sure he would survive again if Loki decided to run a second time. 

But Loki was grinning down at him with a look full of cunning intention and that smooth, addictive madness that had always cracked at the edges of Rebecca’s most stunning smiles. And the demands of Tony’s body rang anything but hollow this time. He wanted that dark grin and everything it promised, no matter how much that scared him. 

Loki finished positioning Tony as he liked and raised his eyebrows in unspoken question. 

Tony took a breath. “We’re all good here. C’mon.” 

The mortal blinked at the proximity and charge when the god leaned in closer, scrutinizing his features. “You seem nervous.” Words of concern, but Loki’s tone was appreciative, like his lover’s apprehension was pretty thing to look on. 

The smile Tony offered in answer wasn’t quite bravado, and his short, breathless laugh didn’t quite work to cut the mood. “Heh. Well, it’s my first time with magic.” 

“Actually,” Loki informed him smugly, “it’s not.” 

Tony stared dumbfounded up at Loki as the trickster pushed into him, mind working frantically through all their previous sexual encounters, deciphering the implications of those words and trying to determine _when_ that could have been. Needing to pinpoint the moment. And Loki was doing this on purpose, Loki _must_ be doing this on purpose, because now Tony was simultaneously feeling the push and pressure and stretch of the god filling him, and having his thoughts driven with all the captive force of a newfound puzzle through every other moment they’d had together in which lust and pleasure had distracted him enough that he wouldn’t _notice_ something like that. It was like a trap, the two sensations overlapping, each demanding his attention in opposite directions and together tangling him up in thoughts and emotions, hot recollections and pressure and the melting burn of being taken. 

Loki noticed the thoughts and confusion flickering through Tony’s expression, and a vindicated glint came into the trickster’s eyes. “You like that, don’t you?” he asked softly. “The not knowing? An unanswered question, maddening as a touch too light?” Loki wrapped a hand around Tony’s length, stroking up far, far too gently to demonstrate his point, and Tony made a weak affirmative noise, bucking up into the motion, seeking more pressure and not finding it, the answer out of reach. _When?_

Then Loki started to move, drawing back and pushing in, and Tony was losing the fight to think with any echo of clarity, the involuntary grip of his curiosity pulled apart finger by finger as the god found an angle he liked and set into a steady, mind-melting rhythm. Tony found he wasn't much in control of what was coming out of his mouth, and he was pretty sure he was switching randomly between calling his partner "Becky" and "Loki," but Loki seemed a little too busy getting fully acquainted with the inside of Tony to care. 

For a while, it was just that. Back and forth, push and pull, breathing and gasping and muttering lost things and absent desperations. Skin and friction and sweat and two sets of strong male hands wandering and gripping for leverage and gripping for touch, satisfying curiosity with sensory input and more advantageous handholds. Back and forth. Push and pull. Mutters and lost things and absent desperations and the build of repeating motions. 

Tony felt the heat of it all stretching tight to snap, and thought to push away enough to see Loki’s face, but found his body unwilling to obey him. “Loki, please, so close, too close, so good, Loki, god -- ” 

He was losing to the pounding rhythm inside him, hearing Loki’s breath come shorter and more vocal in low panting bursts, lost in desire, driven hard by want. They were coming together, a rare experience for them. Even years before, once they had familiarized themselves with each other’s bodies and lusts, they had usually done this by turns, one reveling in their control while the other’s control shattered. 

Wrapped too tight to Loki to see his expression, Tony smelled the sweat-damp black hair his nose was nearly buried in, and thought that _together_ was a nice way to fall apart. Right here, both too blinded by pleasure to see it happen and to bound up in joy to pull away and look. 

Again that sense of something hot breaking deep in his chest, deep in his everywhere, and they were both drowning in the sounds the other made as they hit orgasm -- startled, rough groans that they could feel thrumming in each other's necks amongst a mess of vibration and aftershocks. 

It was probably too much breaking, and certainly too much melting together, hot and close and far from wise. It was closeness, and the presages of trust. 

Loki rode them both through it and then fell slack, draped loose and heavy over every inch of Tony, both bodies heaving with exertion. 

The inventor felt a sleepy, ecstatically contented grin spread across his face as they recovered their breath, chests rising and falling, the air Loki expelled scattering against Tony’s shoulder. 

The god pulled out and shifted over onto his side, and Tony followed the motion, despite the discomfort of sweaty skin shifting against skin when they were both still hypersensitive. 

They settled close together all the same, Loki on his back and Tony tucked close under his arm. 

Tony watched as Loki blinked contentedly at the ceiling, old bliss sketched in new features, and Tony wanted to memorize this too. (In case he lost it again.) For no reason at all but the wanting. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, everyone! At current projections, there are two chapters left to go; please feel free to pester me to write more, especially after a week or so once the glow of posting this one has faded a bit :)
> 
> Also: we've just crossed 100 bookmarks with this fic! *Throws Confetti* Kind of in awe over here, honestly. Thanks so much to everyone who's bookmarked or commented!
> 
> ~Rose


	6. Sick of Just Starting Plans

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Relationships are hard. Relationships with Gods? Might be a teensy bit more hard.

For a while, Tony and Loki dozed together where they lay. Nothing in the approaching day was immediate. Sure, bad guys and fire-monsters and other things that could definitely be put on hold. Nothing appealing enough to make them leave their nest of sheets and pillows and each other.

At one point Loki roused himself far enough to mutter a spell that made several cold, sticky spots on Tony’s person vanish pleasantly.

The inventor muttered a few slurred, sleepy complaints about particles disappearing and the conservation of mass, but he was inwardly pretty content with the whole situation.

It was about half an hour later that Loki stretched expansively, doing a wonderful imitation of a cat, and in the process of easing out of the stretch, shifted to her female form as if it were as natural a thing as pulling her arm back down. She rolled over toward Tony again and raised her eyebrows questioningly.

“Rebec-Loki?” Tony corrected himself, not able to resist touching the newly long, loose black curls of Loki’s hair. “I thought we established that you didn’t have to pretend for me.”

Loki shrugged her bare shoulders and spoke with a voice now softer and rich with a more womanly elegance. “I’m as much _me_ in this form as any other.”

“You look... exactly the same,” Tony said, a little hoarsely. There were so many layers to this, and seeing her now the way she had looked long ago was still so painful. It clawed at the scar tissue in Tony’s soul in a way that Loki’s male form couldn’t manage. But Tony wouldn’t wish her away.

Loki looked his face up and down thoughtfully, reaching out a soft, feminine hand to stroke his cheek. “But you don’t. Eighteen years. You’ve got some grey hair.”

Tony propped his head on one fist. “You could have been here.”

She frowned, stifled anger and guilt and a hint of affrontedness, like he was wrong, like she’d had no choice.

But Loki didn’t open her mouth to make any such claim, and Tony didn’t open his mouth to accuse her further, and the resentment sat, a thing that would probably always linger between them.

Just like love would.

“I’m here _now_ ,” Loki pointed out.

“I’ll take it,” Tony replied immediately. He pulled her close and let his hands slide over her again, and felt desire and the sore weight of heartache seep through his whole body at the familiar and long-mourned sensation of her body held close against his. “I’ll take it.”

Eventually they grew restless enough to toss back and forth plans for things like breakfast and defeating supervillains. “What’s the status on Victor von Dubious Fashion Choices? We caught him, right?”

Loki shifted against his side, absently kissing his shoulder and tugging closer with a leg hooked over his. “Yes, SHIELD has him, but Killian is still in hiding. How do you feel about pancakes?”

“I could do pancakes.” Tony noticed that one of his hands was playing with her hair again, and didn’t stop it. “So, do we need a new plan to find the guy? Your alias contacted him, right? Is your cover blown?”

“No, my cover is fine. My alias’s application to the Extremis program is still under consideration. That will take time, so the day after tomorrow I’m leaving on my own business for a few days.”

“A few days?” Tony echoed.

Loki’s shoulders sagged against the pillows and she gave the heavens an exasperated glance as she took in the tenor of Tony’s reaction. “Yes.”

“Can I come with you?”

“No. Tony, it’s _just_ a few days.”

“Yeah. Right.”

“Tony….”

“I _believe_ you,” Tony claimed stubbornly.

She gave him an acerbic look and leaned in to kiss him, and Tony kissed her back with a little too much desperation.

“A few days,” she said again, closed her eyes and lay back down, and they both let the conversation drop.

Of course he believed her.

.:.

For two days Tony was in every kind of heaven. He ignored phone calls from his fellow Avengers, having Jarvis make excuses when they started to worry.

He was, for once, granted some leeway to ask uncomfortable questions about Loki’s past, and the mystery that Rebecca had presented finally started to open to him in the form of stories and deeper mysteries, knowledges gathered over the course of the many centuries that Loki had been alive to mock and dissect the universe.

Tony asked Happy to dig up their old notes on particle physics from a box labeled, “ _emotional landmines, don’t, I don’t care how drunk you are, just DON’T_ ,” in a dusty closet in the Malibu house, which he then had shipped to New York overnight.

On the second day Tony and Loki pored through the notebooks and Loki expanded on the applications and behaviors of magical energy in ambrosial detail. Those discussions most often began as pillow talk, and each one sooner or later revealed itself to be foreplay. And having Rebec- _Loki_ ride him while she whispered in his ear about the refraction patterns of magically generated photons… Well, actually, they had done that _before_ , just not quite this exhaustively. The toe-curling, mind-twisting, breath-stealing kind of exhaustively.

An hour later, Tony was still staring up at the ceiling, and only just recovering the faculties to mumble incoherently at it. “I’m fucked. I’m so fucked. I’m never gonna be able to _science_ again without thinking about that. And then I’m just never gonna be able to science again. You’ve destroyed my career. I had it all. I had a towering intellect. I even had a tower to go with it. All lost because of one woman. Man. Tricky-sexy-god-person who leaves heartbreaking notes with codes in them and ruins my life.”

Loki smiled, smug and melancholy, and nudged at his leg with her foot. “Is that to be my new title?”

The mortal considered. “Well, you’re not gonna break up with me via cryptogram _again_ , are you?”

Aware that he had meant it as more a joke, aware that she’d already promised _never again_ , Loki made a displeased face at how genuine Tony’s question came out sounding. She chose not to answer directly, far from eager to repeat what might fast become an old argument.

Instead she said lightly, “I like to think you wouldn't be fooled twice by the same cypher.”

But Tony shifted toward her, mood turning serious. “When you wrote me that note, did you really think I’d pick up on it? The ‘first letter’ thing?”

“No,” she replied honestly. “But it seemed… fitting. To tell you in some form, even if you couldn’t see it.”

He met her eyes, searching, and frowned. “I think on some level you assumed that if I really wanted to be with you, I’d figure it out.”

Loki froze and stared back. Her gaze flicked briefly to an introspective distance. Considering it. After consideration, not denying it.

“That’s a crappy assumption,” Tony informed her.

Relaxing a bit, she tossed her head slightly in wry agreement. “Well. It would hardly be my first.”

He grinned. “Fair enough.”

“ _Am_ I?” she challenged.

“No. You’re not fair.” Tony got up into his knees and crawled closer, until he was leaning over her with his hands planted on either side of her shoulders. “You’re a _mean person_. And you’re a genius. Creative. Sexy,” he added as he warmed to his topic. “Utterly captivating. You’ve risked your life to save mine. When I used to think _I_ could be the person who protected you. You look at me like….”

He paused long enough that his next words seemed to stand on their own. “You actually love me. Somehow. None of that’s fair. None of the things I just said are even distantly-- _mmph_!” he complained as she took hold of his head and dragged him down for a kiss.

But he didn’t complain for long, because she brought teeth and aggression into the kiss. He willingly shifted down into the fray, easing his weight onto his elbows against the bed and onto her body under him. Being pressed close against all that warm, naked skin was distracting, seductive and pleasant, and Tony’s head was clouded with it, but he fought past that, kept some force in the kiss, pushing for… not so much for dominance as for the joy of pushing.

The woman under him was definitely calling the shots right now, threading one long-fingered hand into his hair and gripping tight enough to direct every motion.

She broke away and grinned as she muttered a few words in an exotic language, the accent of which Tony was only just starting to recognize. A well-practiced sleight of hand convinced the universe that she held an unwrapped condom in her free hand, and, resultingly, she did.

His breath hitched a bit at the deft touches she used to apply the latex. “Oh, you’re really not fair.”

“But I’m being so _nice_ , sweetheart,” she pointed out coyly as she took hold of his hip and guided him down into her.

“Nnnnot gonna… argue with… _shit_ , that’s good,” he managed, closing his eyes with the effort of not immediately picking up too fast a pace. His heart was pounding hard in his chest with how _good_ this felt, but still, he pulled back slowly, readying himself for a leisurely thrust.

Loki wrapped her legs around his waist and tugged down with one heel, pulling him further in one impatient motion, and the _pressure_ of it… Tony got the hint.

Time passed and built in sweat and his quickening pulse, watching how her face scrunched or went slack when he hit just the right spot, until he was racking his brain for something else to focus on to keep this from ending too soon.

“We should…” He struggled for breath. “...s-slow down.”

“ _No_ ,” she refused smoothly, and tightened around him.

Tony gasped, and his body arched forward of its own will. His forehead was suddenly pressed to the pillow beside Loki’s head, and his hips drove down into hers faster and harder than he’d been letting himself move. He was still trying to make it last, still trying to recover some tiny inkling of self-control.

Then she did it again.

He fell helplessly into the faster rhythm she set. Fingertips ran electric down his sides and her mouth skimmed softly over the line of his shoulder, and he was thrusting down, and down, and it was good, and so much more than he could take.

He came hard. Too soon, to hazard a guess, but it was hard to worry about something like that when his veins were on fire with pleasure. He made a noise, a messier version of a groan, as the feeling went through him like white fire.

Too much, too good, too right.

He gave a few more unsteady thrusts. Her naked thighs and calves were wrapped tight around his hips, warm and perfect, and then hot and painful as his climax eased away.

He pulled at her legs to disentangle, but she was stronger than her slim form implied. Loki held tight and made a noise of complaint. She hadn’t fully peaked yet, but she was close, starting to buck and squirm in objection to Tony’s halted movement.

Which… _ow_.

Tony gave a wincing, breathy chuckle and leaned forward to find Loki’s ear, nipping lightly at it to get her attention. “You did set the pace, honey. Stop crushing my pelvis, and I’ll make it worth your while. Deal?”

Her legs unwrapped from his frame and settled with her feet planted on the bed. Compliance that belied the note of sadism in her voice when she replied, just as breathless, “But I like seeing you squirm, love.”

Fighting a wave of exhausted contentment, Tony shifted his hips away from hers and tilted his head in reply. “Well, _ditto_ , but…”

He settle the heel of his hand firmly between her legs, leaning his weight into it, and watched her close her eyes and exhale a long breath of relief and pleasure, before she pushed up into his hand for more and muttered in unintelligible approval.

“...I think I like _this_ better.”

With his other hand he stroked up and down her thigh, the joint and muscles and valleys of smooth skin, familiar under his hand with long experience.

He searched out the spots that made her relax, tense up, gasp, and groan, working counterpoint the thumb he had circling just next to her clit, straddling the well-practiced balance between _too little_ and _too much_ , loving her reactions he teased at both edges of that balance.

Loki was already close, already arching unthinkingly into every motion he made, and it was gratifying. Not arousing exactly -- he was still getting his breath back from his earlier orgasm. It was more the thrill of trusting the proficiency of his own mind and hands. It was like a battle that way, with his heart pounding and something really good -- good like staying alive -- to be managed if he used his skills just so. A balance that took all his finely honed attention to strike.

She was close again, almost coming, and he hooked a hand under her knee and lifted just far enough that she lost some of her sense of purchase on the mattress, just enough to make her fingers grip tight in the sheets in an attempt ground herself while she screamed his name.

Damn, she was beautiful.

His name wasn’t half bad either.

She came down from the high, closing her eyes for seconds at a stretch as she breathed through it, as one trying to subdue their outward reaction to pain. Or, in this case, the opposite thing.

Tony slid his hands away from her and let himself fall heavily beside her on the mattress, finally giving in to his own exhaustion.

They drifted and dozed together again, riding a haze that was thick and warm as blood from an open wound, all contentment and pain.

It must have eventually just been Tony dozing, because he came awake when Loki spoke.

“I’m leaving early tomorrow morning. Do you want me to wake you?”

Tony shot her a lopsided grimace from where he lay at her side, a few inches of distance between them. “If you wake me up, I’ll try to talk you out of going. So yes.”

“‘No,’ it is then,” she said pointedly.

He groaned and wriggled closer to wrap an arm around her shoulders. “I just got you back. _Just_. Do you have to go so soon?”

She settled her head against his upper arm, watching his face as she combed a thoughtful hand through the short hair of his beard. “I’ve already delayed far longer than I should.”

.:.

When Loki’s weight rolled off the bed the next morning, Tony woke just enough to return her farewell kiss and murmur sleepy endearments, and then resolutely slipped back into unconsciousness before the moment she actually left.

That preparation did little to blunt the instinctive fear he felt when he really did wake fully to find his bed rumpled and empty, and the sore knowledge deep in his chest that she was far away and beyond his capacity to track.

She was gone.

Tony held rigidly still as he waited for it to pass, not quite a panic attack, but something similar of a lower tone, a wave of bleak anxiety that washed his body full of cold aches and churning nausea.

When the worst of it subsided, Tony still felt no real desire to move. He was considering wallowing here all day in the lingering smell of her and in the cold of old wounds scabbing over, when he caught sight of a note on the nightstand.

Tony didn’t immediately reach for it, just stared wide-eyed at the thing for nearly a minute, torn between humor, irritation and paralyzing terror.

It _must_ be a note, right?

A scrap of paper that hadn’t been there before, much like last time.

Humor finally won out and he broke down into a fit of laughter that was itself rather broken. She had left him a note again. _Seriously_?

Tony curled in on himself until enough of the wheezing, hysterical amusement ran its course that he could twist out to reach toward the table. “I’m in love with a sadistic lunatic,” he muttered breathlessly to himself and he snatched the paper and read it.

_Inventor whom i love like ruin, enough to undertake remaining near, stop obsessing over nonsense._

Tony made a face at the paper, read it a bit more closely, and then smiled softly to himself.

He showered and went down to seek a breakfast in the kitchen on the conference floor, where other Avengers could often be found if they were feeling social.

The trappings of normal life fell back into place. Things like bathing and dressing and walking through the tower he’d built up around himself far from stinging memories. They served to stabilize and lift his mood so he was almost himself again by the time he reached the kitchen.

Natasha sat crosslegged on the counter, picking her way through a bowl of fruit salad. “Where have you been for two days?”

“Um.” Tony went to the opposite counter to pour himself some coffee from a recently brewed pot. “Well, Loki and I were engaging in a kind of… _cultural exchange_. Of knowledge. And bodily fluids.” He turned to face her unapologetically, coffee in hand.

Natasha frowned and gave him a curious head tilt that almost hid her horror. “Please tell me that’s just a really unfortunate way of saying you handed each other test tubes for nerdy scientific purposes.”

Tony sipped his coffee and then poured in some cream. “There was definitely a lot of experimentation involved. And also some science separately from that. And not-so-separately. It was a very nice two days.”

“So where is he now?” She popped a grape in her mouth.

“Away. Didn’t say where.”

“He gonna be back in time to keep up his cover with Killian?”

Tony looked down at his drink and found his reflection there, almost invisible in the lighter color. “Yeah, but I’m a little worried that he didn’t capitalize the ‘I.’ Kind of uncharacteristic, y’know?”

“What?”

Tony looked up. “What? Nothing.”

Natasha propped an elbow on her knee and rested her head against her fist. “Tony, are you familiar with the term ‘compromised?’”

“Yep.” Tony put a hand to his heart. “It’s about people putting aside their differences and meeting halfway and working together for the common good… _Compromise_. It’s a beautiful thing.”

“Uh- _huh_.” She unfolded her legs and stepped down from the counter, standing to leave with her bowl of fruit still neatly in hand. “You’re really something, Stark.”

“Aren’t we all?”

“Not really,” she replied, disappearing around a corner.

.:.

Tony retreated to the lab after that, making as much time as he could disappear into diagrams and alloys and carefully calculated joint ranges.

Peter showed up after school on the second day. Tony didn’t really notice his arrival, so much as he just eventually registered that one of the assistants he’d been ordering around could actually hold a magnifying glass as directed.

But for once Tony was the one to start a conversation not related to building armor. “So, what exactly is a Jotun?”

Perched in a chair a few feet away where he’d been waiting for further direction, Peter looked at the ceiling, thinking about it. “I’m not sure _exactly_. Enemies of Asgard. Lemme think, I learned this stuff a really long time ago. Well, when my mom turns Jotun, she’s blue all over, with red eyes.”

Tony scrunched up his face. “...Creepy.”

“No, it’s… it’s _magnificent_ ,” Peter corrected emphatically. “You have to see it. It’s, like, scary-looking but in a good way? Like a wild animal, you know? It was basically my favorite thing when I was a kid. Other kids liked dinosaurs or tigers or whatever, but _my mom_ was a _Frost Giant_.”

The phone rang before Tony could come up with a response.

He pulled it out of his pocket and found that the number just read “Loki.”

And that was odd. Loki had gone back to using his old cell phone number, but it had reappeared in Tony’s phone under its original listing of “Becky,” so Loki wasn’t calling from his cell or any number Tony had listed.

A little confused and a lot relieved, Tony picked up the phone. “Loki. You actually called.”

Loki’s male voice answered, “Every time you pick up the phone sounding so surprised, it’s a little more insulting.” Then he sighed. “I’ll be a little late coming home.”

“How late?”

“Difficult to say. One of my aliases has landed himself in prison.”

“I’ll make some calls - ”

“...on Asgard.”

“Shit.”

“Don’t panic, love. I have twenty escape plans, and eleven of them may actually work. I will be at least a week, however.”

“What did you do, anyway?”

“I failed to steal something.”

“Okay.” Tony took a breath. “Don’t do that again.”

“Of course not,” came the reply, tone obvious. “Next time I intend to succeed.”

“Of course you do.”

After a pause, Loki reiterated, “I _am_ coming home.”

Tony sighed. “Yeah, yeah. I believe you.”

And he did. It really was different, the whole situation made less terrifying somehow now that Loki was calling him. The new events no longer echoed the old ones, and the deja vu that had been haunting Tony started to crack apart.

“How long can you stay on the line?” Tony asked.

“Until the guard comes back. A few minutes, but the spell I used to call you will only work once.”

Tony got up to start pacing and rolled his eyes. _Magic_. “So we can at least talk a little before your phone turns back into a pumpkin.”

“It was a mouse,” Loki corrected immediately.

Tony stilled. “...Wait, seriously?”

“No.” A smile at Tony’s expense could be heard in Loki’s voice. Then the god took a breath. “If a _mouse_ could get in and out of these walls, _I’_ d have no trouble at all.”

“You’re sure you can get out? Because if you’re not _back_ in a week, I’m gonna…” Tony struggled to conjure up a sufficiently dire threat. “...go and rescue you,” he finished lamely.

“Oh hells,” Loki muttered in tones of real dread. “Give me two weeks.”

“You said _one_!” Tony reminded him, aggravated.

“I said _at least_!” Loki said, matching his ire.

“ _Oh yeah_?! Well _I_... I... really miss you,” Tony admitted, and sat again.

Loki expelled a sigh that crackled across the surface of whatever device he was speaking into. “If you were here I’d pin you against one of these walls and fuck you mindless until you didn’t know frequency from wavelength. Suffice to say, I miss you too.”

Tony found that his mouth was dry. There was a witty retort about the relativity of spacetime to be made here, and the fact that it was eluding him just now added a certain inescapable validity to Loki’s threat. “Oh god.”

“I appreciate your accuracy.”

Tony cleared his throat. “So, um, Peter’s here.”

Peter was focusing his eyes resolutely on the screen of his own smartphone. “If you guys are casually discussing icky things again, I really, _really_ don’t want to know about it. Really.”

Loki’s voice on the phone said, “Oh. I see. May I speak to him?”

Tony handed the phone over. “It’s your mom.”

Peter took the phone, pocketing his own. “Hi Mom. What’s up? Wait. You’re _where_? ...O- _kay_. Okay, well it’s good to know that if I ever get into a huge amount of trouble, you won’t be able to tell me off. No, I know, I won’t get caught. I was kidding. …Yeah, we’re good. …Seems fine so far. I mean, y’know, miserable, but okay. …Oh, already? Sucks. Okay, I’ll tell him. Bye.” Peter hung up the phone and handed it back to Tony. “The guard came back early, so he had to hang up. He said to tell you he loves you.”

Tony took the phone back and tossed it thoughtfully in his hand a few times before pocketing it. “Alright. Back to work.”

.:.

“Stark, you’re three days late for debriefing,” was how Fury began the next meeting of the Avengers.

“Sorry, got stuck in traffic or something, probably,” Tony quipped uninterestedly.

“Seeing as it’s your tower Doom’s android managed to infiltrate, I’ve been waiting with bated breath to hear exactly how that happened.”

“That part’s pretty simple honestly.” Tony shrugged. “We hired her.”

“Without a background check?” Fury persisted.

“We did a background check,” Tony assured him. “Totally free of criminal records, which is really not all that impressive from someone who’s only existed for two or three years, tops. Let’s cut to the chase: Yes, my people messed up. Yes, we’re now tightening up security. Pepper Potts is on the case, which is tantamount to saying we will never have this problem ever again. Now can we move one? Because I’m pretty sure we’ve still got a crazy scientist to catch.”

“Killian’s laying low right now,” Natasha informed him. “Off-the-radar level laying low. SHIELD hasn’t got any leads. Until either he makes a move or Loki comes back, we’re at a standstill.”

“A.K. has this way of kidnapping people when left to his own devices,” Tony pointed out. “Also blowing people up.”

“Well then,” said Clint. “Where’s Loki?”

Everyone looked to Tony expectantly.

Disappointedly.

Tony leaned back, wary. “What am I, Thor’s brother’s keeper?”

The _disappointed_ looks got worse. Evidently, they’d all been talking to Natasha.

“Fine. Sure,” Tony gave in. “He got a little delayed on a trip. Says he’ll be back in less than two weeks, how’s that?”

Thor leaned in and spoke cautiously. “Tony, what is your relationship to my brother?”

“Is this an intervention? Because honestly one of those was one too many.”

“Do you know where Loki is?” Natasha asked.

Tony tapped the table with his open palm. “Plead the fifth.”

“It doesn’t work that way, Tony,” Steve informed him.

“No seriously, can I have a fifth of scotch for this conversation? Please?”

Steve pressed his hands together and dragged them down the center of his face. “It _really_ doesn’t work that way, Tony.”

Natasha leveled the inventor with a cold look. “Were you sleeping with him before you vouched for him to Fury?”

“No!” How long before were they talking? “...Kind of. But that’s not why I backed him.”

Natasha closed her eyes for a long, aggravated moment, then leaned forward. “Tony. Let me _explain_ to you the meaning of the word ‘compromised.’”

Tony held up his hands defensively. “Well either you _want_ Loki’s help or you _don’t_. Which is it?”

“Is your relationship with Loki a threat to this team? Yes, or no?”

Tony opened his mouth to say _no_ , then paused for a very long time, considering the somewhat irrefutable fact that he cared more about Loki than he did about any of his fellow Avengers. “Well, it _is_ , and it _isn’t_. I mean, that’s really a very philosophical question.”

“No it’s not,” said Clint flatly.

“What _is_ a team, really?” Tony continued as if he hadn’t heard. “What is a relationship? What is a threat?”

Natasha’s eyes narrowed. “You can either spontaneously recall how to use the English language and start giving me straight answers or you can spend the next three weeks scrubbing your own blood out of this carpet. _That’s_ a threat,” she illustrated calmly.

Tony gave her a wounded look. “Have you considered that that aggression might be a compromising force to the trust and integrity of this team?”

Her eyes narrowed further and she clenched her jaw, but Tony thought she might actually be suppressing a laugh. Maybe.

Steve sighed and took his turn. “Tony, we’re your friends. We’re not against you, but I need to know if I can rely on you. For that, you _have_ to be honest with us. If you’re in bed with one our enemies and -- ”

“Except he’s not one of our enemies right now, is he?” Tony cut in. “He’s an ally. The longer he stays our ally, the safer we all are. Or am I the only one who saw how much he helped us against Doom?”

“And when he stops being our ally?” This question came, surprisingly, from Thor.

_I guess he’s been there once or twice_ , Tony thought with a wince. “Maybe he won’t,” he replied with a shrug.

“We may need Loki right now, but that’s one more reason not let our guard down,” Natasha reasoned. “For all we know he was never on your side and he’s just using you. Can’t be the first time that’s happened.”

That _hurt_ , and Tony spoke with more genuine irritation. “Thank you, Inigo Montoya, for bringing up such a painful memory. While you’re at it, why don’t you go get a career stabbing nice people for money.”

She shrugged off the barb. “Loki’s criminally insane. He’s a threat to everything we’re trying to protect.”

“I don’t think it’s that simple! Is anyone gonna back me up here? I do kinda owe him my life.”

Steve leaned forward and spoke in the most infuriatingly reasonable tone possible. “Yes, and we’re grateful for that, but that doesn’t make it safe to sympathize with him.”

Tony crossed his arms, pointedly unimpressed. “You have got to be kidding me.”

The captain did seem to realize how that sounded, but he just added, “You know what I mean.”

“People can change.”

“Some people,” Natasha said. “But Loki’s a deranged psychopath, and good at acting like he’s not. You can’t seriously be this naive.”

Tony stood. “I think we’re done here.”

“Tony…” Steve tried again, but the inventor didn’t stick around to hear how that sentence ended.

He closed the door after him a little too firmly, and the rest of the Avengers stared at it for moment after he left, a bit shocked.

“Alright, we’ll talk about his another day,” Steve concluded in defeat. “Let’s just… move onto the next order of business. Who’s been eating all the fruit salad?”

.:.

Tony contemplated his bed that evening with all the apprehension of a man looking down on the course of an ill-advised base jump. Tony thought he’d rather take the base jump.

The bed was neatly made, the covers turned back. Neat and empty.

With a sigh and a head shake, he pulled up the sheets and crawled under, trepidation in his every motion as he settled his head onto the pillow and closed his eyes. Jarvis extinguished the lights.

The air in his nose was clean and cool, the sheets soft around him, the ambient noises of the tower low and quiet and constant. It should all be so calming. But there was a sharp ache in his head that wasn’t quite physical, an insistent awareness of the world around him, solid and inescapable. The blur and nonsense of dreams was nowhere near this place.

Tony took a deep breath and tried a relaxation exercise his therapist had recommended to help him sleep, one that actually worked sometimes. He imagined parts of his body in turn growing heavy like iron, turning to iron in fact, growing solid and leaden until they sank through mattress and floor and on toward the center of the earth, leaving adrift whatever was left of his body when all the iron fell away, loose and fuzzy like a dispersing ghost.

Tonight, it didn’t help. His perception remained sharp to the smell of laundry soap and to every fold of cloth that pressed against his skin.

This was all familiar. The cold of the deserted bed was _familiar_. The ache in his chest, _familiar_. The wakeful thoughts circling restless through his head, _familiar_. The tantalizing and far-exaggerated daydream of how easily he would slip into unconsciousness with a little good liquor flowing warm in his blood…

Tony sat up and called, “Jarvis, lights,” in a rough voice, retreating from a battle that was sleep before he felt himself in danger of losing a larger war.

He scrubbed his hands hard through his hair, struggling to come fully awake now that being anything but awake seemed well out of the cards. Might as well get some work done. “Where are we with the new joint lubricant?”

He stood and started towards the lab, still rubbing his forehead as he listened to Jarvis’s rundown of the oil in question. “Repeated exposures of matching humero-ulnar gauntlet parts to flexion and extension have revealed Mr. Parker’s proposed alternative to last nearly twice as long as the current oil. The glide is lessened, increasing the power drain of the motion by 2%. Negligible. Sir might consider seeking an oil with further decreased glide for joints associated with bodily motion, to decrease the danger of whiplash should the suit malfunction.”

“Or a substance that limits glide based on speed,” Tony suggested, falling into the rhythm of the brainstorm, and he was gone from reality much farther than sleep would ever take him. “Not sacrifice energy any more than we have to.”

And so it went.

.:.

“You really should eat,” was the first thing Loki said to him when she appeared in Tony’s lab six days later.

“Ah!” Tony started, spinning to face her. “Geez. How did you get in here?”

“Discreetly. How long have you been working? You look awful.” She walked up and pressed close to him and placed a hand on his cheek with a soft, seductive tenderness that Tony found both intoxicating and entirely suspicious. Her dress was green silk and black lace and her eyes were all divine mischief.

He stared at her, his own eyes wide, and replied, “You  _don't_  look awful.”

She smiled graciously at the compliment. _So suspicious_. “Eat something,” she said insistently, pressing an object into his hand that felt like a round, smooth fruit. “And then you can join me for a shower and a good night’s sleep.”

Tony considered. Her suggestions were all sound and pleasant, and whatever she was up to, he’d find out sooner by at least playing at playing along. So he allowed himself to relax, lean in close and breathe her in, enjoy completely the way her presence naturally eased him and set him on edge.

“Tell you what, shower _first_ ,” he kissed lightly at her neck and settled his empty hand on her hip suggestively. “We can order takeout now and it’ll be there when we get out. Eat in bed while you tell me about your trip, hm?”

He pressed the fruit back into her hand without looking at it and pulled back enough to raise his eyebrows at her in question.

She nodded affably and slid her hands up his chest and around his neck, the fruit she’d handed him gone the moment it was returned to her. “I suppose the order of events is open to negotiation.”

Tony smiled and kissed her. He doubted he tasted very good -- (when _had_ he brushed his teeth last?) -- but there was connection and warmth and coming home in all the shapes and pressures and buzzing chemistries of the kiss, and in a matter of seconds Loki was pulling his head down with real hunger, insistent in a way that jolted his mind straight back to their first night together years ago, to how demanding she’d gotten when she realized how far he could break her down.

The kiss ended, and Tony had to drag himself back to catch his breath, mouth still half-open as if to catch at hers again, part of him not quite accepting the inch of distance that he and Loki had just put between themselves.

He rested his forehead against hers and smiled. “Jarvis, order a little of everything from that vegetarian place I like.”

He didn’t pause to hear Jarvis’s affirmative reply before he moved in to kiss her again, feeling the angle of her jaw under his fingers, the soft lines of her neck as he let his hand slide downward, just skimming the top of her breast as skin turned to textured fabric under his palm, then down along her side, circling around to press against her lower back and pull her closer. Tony steered them toward his private elevator. Pressed her to the wall as the doors closed, and and she just let him. Yielding.

That yielding scared him.

(Thrilled him.)

(Same thing?)

He took hold of her elbows and pinned them to the wood at her back, restraining, or doing something that was shaped like restraining if you ignored their relative strength. His thumbs stroked where he gripped at her inner arms, and he felt her chuckle at the not-quite-rough treatment, the sound muffled by the kiss.

It was a game to both of them -- a familiar one that played too carelessly with prospect of very real hurt. She would only let him lead, follow exactly the rules he set, for as long as she still had something up her sleeve.

He’d take as much as she let him until she either told him her game or forgot there was a game at all. By which time he would probably have forgotten that he was being had anyway.

It took Tony a few minutes to notice that the elevator had stopped and opened, distracted by necking and by the way her breath came heavy and vocal in his ears. He groaned with the effort of the focus it took to finally pull her away from the wall and move into the room.

They reached his bedroom and stepped out of their shoes without really disentangling, and half a minute later their feet met the cool grey tile of the bathroom adjoining it.

There they paused and looked at each other as they caught their breath, and she glanced down at herself and wordlessly asked if he would undress her, and he gave her a hard look and waited expectantly for her to undress them both.

There was always tension between them, of one kind or another.

She smiled into that tension, stretching it tight until she gave in and waved her hand, banishing their clothing from existence as if it displeased her, like she was gesturing at a disfavored servant to walk away.

(Or maybe just to be beheaded. Judging by the way she smiled.)

(And Tony could swear his mouth tasted mintier now.)

Tony guided her with two hands on her bare hips and walked her backward into the shower. Their feet met lightly textured surface, designed to allow for some friction and grip under flowing water. Tony twisted the tap and set it warm enough that fog started condensing along the tiled walls.

He wrapped one arm back around Loki’s upper thighs and hefted her against the wall. Only, just a bit, just so her heels skimmed the floor but she couldn’t quite rest weight there. The god shifted a bit more precariously onto her toes and the balls of her feet as Tony kissed her again, hard and demanding.

He took his time with that kiss -- because _time_ , because hours and days without her, thinking about when she’d be _home_ , wondering -- he took his time and gripped her close, and worked to convince himself that she was just as real all those hours spent without her.

He sifted through the evidence: skin and pressure and breath and the way her hair smelled under a barrage of hot water.

He found each piece valid and not quite sufficient, wanted more.

(Wanted _proof_ , like any other man who’d been abandoned by a god.)

He pushed closer, pillaging her mouth until she made a high, hungry noise in the back of her throat, and then more until he lost track. He had to lose himself in her to find the seams to break her open by.

He pulled back from the kiss, and it was with an oddly ruthless sort of worship in the frame of his mind that he knelt in front of her, and heard her gasp very lightly as she realized his intentions.

And that was rush of power, to know how much it affected her just to know what he _planned_ to do. “There’s a handrail to your right,” he informed her matter-of-factly. He looked up in time to see her eyes widen just slightly, expression falling a little slack with how the sureness of his tone struck her.

He slid a hand up the inside of her thigh. Let his fingertips skim lightly along her folds. Felt her shudder.

He stilled when the water ran cool on his back.

Right. It did that automatically when the shower was set too hot for too long. Kept Tony from burning himself when inspiration struck in the shower and he lost track of the moment completely.

He huffed at the temperature change, but then grinned triumphantly when he saw and felt the goosebumps rise along Loki’s skin and mouthed at her and heard her make a broken noise in her throat.

He leaned forward. Felt a film of falling water clinging to his face as he licked her, the rasp of wet skin alternating with the slippery lack of traction of skin under flowing water, and it was texture and softness and power as she muttered unedited thoughts.

His fingers teased at her folds for a long time before he pushed one finger in fully, and felt her tense with the pleasure (and for Tony it was _pride_ again that he knew the difference between pleasure and discomfort by the feel of her alone), felt her tense with the pleasure as he stroked almost roughly at the tender skin his fingers found.

She didn’t actually take hold of the handrail until she was almost coming, and then she gripped it tight and made a strangled not-quite-whimper.

Tony eased away a bit, letting her recover. He ran his hand up and down the inside of her thigh again, and he kissed at the prominences of her hip bone. Her breathing calmed. He bit there instead, and made her breathing less calm.

He continued on like that, easing back and then upping the stimulation. At one point Tony tightened his grip on her thigh, where he hadn’t noticed taking hold with his free hand, holding her in place as her body arched involuntarily, neck extending back so the top of her head pressed against the tile behind her.

“Don’t fall over up there,” Tony warned.

“Am I still standing?” she panted. “I hadn’t noticed.”

Having already started mouthing at her clit again, Tony let out a short, muffled, “ _hah_ ” of laughter. And heard a very encouraging gasp above him.

Interesting…

There followed a round of low hums. Shortly joined by harder thrusts of Tony’s fingers inside her, earning a series of approving noises from Loki that climbed higher and higher in pitch. He could hear the moment she lost charge of the sounds she was making, whines and shouts coming louder and louder until they almost qualified as screams.

An echo of the sounds she made was pounding in his chest, pleasure and adrenaline filling his perceptions with satisfying bursts of heady noise.

She came down from the high again, and her head was bowed with it, inhaling harshly to recover her breath. Her eyes bored down into his, the only part of her face that reflected enough light to be clearly visible among the drapes of her wet hair. Her grip on the metal bar was vise-tight and white-knuckled, the only thing holding her above him.

This was about as sex-exhausted as he’d ever seen her, lax and open. Still closed off, still secretive, still playing a game, but to see Loki as _Loki_ was to see Loki hiding something.

By now her legs were shaking too much to really trust any weight to them. Tony braced one arm under her thigh and against the wall to ease her down to a position sitting on the the floor. Her fingers left light indentations in the metal handrail as she released her grip on it.

Once she was on the shower floor and lying back, Tony leaned forward and kissed her stomach with intimate fervor, while she recovered her breath and her hands clumsily found his head and tangled in his damp hair. For the most part, she lay relaxed and unmoving, but her body and hands were still tensing sporadically with pleasure.

Tony reached for a condom (he’d started strategically placing them around the penthouse about two weeks ago now, so of course there were some in the shelving built into the shower), and worked it open with no help whatsoever from the lubricating qualities of running water.

After applying it, he wormed a hand under Loki’s low back, lifting her by that spot to reduce the drag of the whole motion as, with a bit of jostling, he heaved her body closer and lined himself up.

Tony worked to clear his mind as he pushed into her, wetness and pressure and heat conspiring to make the world tilt away and give way to blinding white. _Don’t go into the light, Tony,_ he thought to himself firmly. _It is not your time_.

The noises she made as he pushed in were half complaint, giving voice to the not-quite-tickling sparks of pain that came of over-raw sensitivity, and half approval as she squirmed cooperatively into the motion and sought out more pressure. She groaned in relief when she found a satisfying angle, a deeper pleasure that quieted and dispersed the lesser pains.

Keeping to the angle she’d sought out, Tony started moving, pulling out and pushing back in, earning a breathy, voice-sore groan every time.

Tony listened, riveted. He was so far gone already, and he heard it in the rasp of his own voice when he said, “In case you couldn't tell, I missed you.”

Loki actually tried to form words. Tony had to give her credit for that. He certainly gave himself credit for the little blissed-out whimper that came out instead.

This time, when she came, he felt her muscles tense and shudder around him. He tried to hold out a bit. To ride her through it as far as he was capable. But the white light definitely won out, slamming into him and through him and along the lines of all his nerves with blinding force.

He came with a hot surge and then slowed down to stillness, while Loki made noises that indicated exquisite pleasure. Tony inwardly agreed with every wordless sentiment. Yes. Good. He slumped down in bliss and exhaustion, knowing by now that she was strong enough to comfortably hold his weight while he rested a little while. Breathing. Drifting.

Loki apparently recovered her wits before he did, because his daze was interrupted by the question, “You’re going to fall asleep now, aren’t you?”

“No,” Tony said firmly into her neck, but didn’t move.

The body under him vibrated with a light giggle. “You could at least turn the water off first.”

“I’m _not_ going to fall asleep. I’m not going to turn the water off. I am going to shower. Remember that part where we were going to shower?”

“I think we just did.”

“Doesn’t count.”

“Then I’d be impressed to see what you think _does_ count.”

Tony laughed tiredly.

Loki kept talking, weakly summoning a round of mocking comments to her lips in doubt of his ability to stay awake. Spurred on by that, Tony defiantly wrestled his body up to a standing position and turned the water hot enough to burn a bit and wake him as he set about the task of actually cleaning his body. Showering.

That went quickly enough. The two soon found their way out of the stall and wrapped themselves up in two large white towels. They walked and teased and nudged their way into the bedroom, and Jarvis informed them that food had arrived in the time they’d been occupied.

Tony settled on the bed while Loki retrieved the takeout from where it had been left for them on the floor of his private elevator. She perched herself on the opposite edge of the mattress from him, arranging her towel around herself with modesty and godly precision, the effect of which was ruined a bit when she reached down into the bag she’d brought in and the makeshift garment started falling askew again.

Tony found himself sneaking all sorts of glimpses through the shifting fabric of the towel as if he hadn’t been intimately entwined with that same body a few minutes ago.

Loki distributed the containers atop Tony’s thick, cream-colored comforter. Familiar and enticing sights and aromas made themselves known, and Tony rubbed his hands together, remembering now how hungry he was, eager to eat and eager to introduce Rebecca -- Loki -- _Loki_ to some of the delights he’d discovered since moving to New York.

There was a slice of apple pie among the haul that he didn’t recognize from the restaurant’s very limited menu, but hey, maybe it was a new item.

He put the desserts aside and dived into the joy of good food and Loki’s reaction to tasting new and varied things. Tony had failed entirely to eat regularly of late, and Loki had the appetite of a god, and together they managed to make impressive inroads into the first course. She took a particular liking to a spiced tofu dish, which Tony then started trying to steal from her just for the game of it, failing every time as she caught him in his sleights of hand and tricks of distracting conversation.

He was caught up in wonder and happy exhaustion. Between the effects of sleepless days and the warm glow lingering from his earlier orgasm, Tony was struggling a little to stay awake, but his Loki-is-up-to-something senses were still feeling pleasantly tingly, just enough to help hold sleep at bay.

Loki finished the last bite of tofu and looked to him with raised eyebrows. “What’s for dessert?”

“ _Everything_ is for dessert, but if you want my recommendation...” He selected a package and scooched in close to place it in front of her with a flourish. “White chocolate cheesecake. It’s better than sex.”

“Really?” Her tone was dubious and warm. “And what are you having?”

“Still… making up my mind.” Tony cocked his head at her teasingly. “Well, it would have to be something delicious.” He kissed her arm and tasted clean, shower-damp skin.

That earned a low little chuckle. “Something enticing?” she further suggested.

“Mm.” He tackled her flat to the bed and grinned as she let him. “Something brilliant.”

“You still haven’t eaten dessert,” she pointed out.

Tony’s eyes flicked appreciatively down her body and he opened his mouth to continue his double entendre, but she pouted up at him reproachfully. “You _did_ promise white chocolate cheesecake, yes?”

“It might not _actually_ be better than sex with _me_ ,” Tony reneged plaintively.

She raised an eyebrow. “When you’re this tired?”

The mortal sighed, because she was right. He’d probably fall asleep during a second round anyway, and that was disappointing for everyone. He heaved himself up to a sitting position, the action taking enough effort to further bring home her point, and handed her the appropriate box and a fresh fork. “There you go. Food of the gods.”

“Mm, too bad there’s only one of me,” she replied before taking a bite and promptly closing her eyes in ecstasy.

Already processing her words and beginning to consider the possibilities associated with more than one Loki, Tony took in her expression and felt a strange sort of melting short-circuit in his brain as imagination met visual stimulus. She was still flat on her back, towel dislodged enough that he could see one breast and a world of skin, and the look on her face just wasn’t fair.

He stared transfixed until she swallowed and looked to him questioningly. “Are you going to eat anything yourself, or just stare?”

“Just stare,” Tony replied immediately, but contrary to that he unwrapped a new fork for himself and pulled at the pie curiously to try it.

The thing certainly looked all kinds of appetizing. The crust was flaky and pale gold in color, the filling that deep auburn of apples cooked in cinnamon and brown sugar. Food of the gods, indeed.

Lifting the plastic lid, Tony took a bite, chewed a couple times, and froze.

He grabbed a napkin and spat out the mouthful with the slow, careful alertness of a man who had been on the battlefield many times before, and who sensed enough imminent danger to suspect he might be on one again.

Loki was sitting up now, having put down her own dish to watch him, and she tilted her head as she re-wrapped her towel adeptly. “You don’t like it?”

“It’s the best goddamn pie I’ve ever tasted,” Tony corrected, displeased. “It’s better than the laws of physics allow pie to be. It’s _magic_ pie.”

He put down his fork and twisted in his seat to look Loki hard in the eyes. “Now, I know I’ve gotten prettier with age, but if me being The Fairest Of Them All is a _problem_ for you, that’s something we may need to talk about.”

Loki leaned back and crossed her arms, annoyed at being found out. “You really should eat the rest. I promise it won’t kill you.”

“Well, what _will_ it do?” Tony pressed, irritated and unamused by her hedging.

She met his look squarely. “If you eat it, you won’t die.”

“Yeah, you actually mentioned that a… _Oh_ ,” Tony finished with a look of dawning realization. He looked at the dessert with renewed unease and scooched back from it a little. “Just like that? Eat pie, become immortal?”

“I think we’ve established that it’s _magic_ pie,” Loki reminded him, her voice flat and trenchant.

Tony stared at her. His eyes narrowed as he realized the extent of the decision she had tried to make for him. “And I’m guessing by the fact that you _didn’t lead with that information_ that you had some sense I might not be on board with this whole plan. Which, about that? I’m avoiding unnatural preservatives.”

Loki neatly sidestepped his accusation with another. “How readily you change your tune. _You_ said I could keep you until the realms fell away.”

“I said you could _start_ to. Also, I thought we were talking figuratively. For the record.”

“So you lied,” she concluded sharply.

“No,” Tony denied, and then grimaced. “I didn’t _mean_ to.”

“What is this if I can’t believe a word you say?”

“Wait, now _I’_ m suddenly the one who’s untrustworthy?” Tony demanded, gesturing at his own chest.

“It rather looks that way.”

“I hate to keep harping on this sweetheart, but _you’re the one who left_.”

“And that absolves you of sin?” Loki questioned at a deadly whisper.

“No, but, look.” Tony took a breath and held up his hands in a _let’s all calm down_ motion that didn’t actually do much to calm either of them down. “Okay, say I do it. Say I take the red pill, hop my fluffy tail down the pie hole, and live forever. What then? How do I know you won’t disappear again?”

“Why would I?”

“Because _you’re still_ keeping things from me. What happens if you get scared again, huh? If you head for the hills, then what am I supposed to do for the rest of eternity, sit on my hands?”

“I won’t.”

“And you want me to bet everything on the notion you’re correct about that?” Tony questioned, eyebrows raised.

“Tony, I promise--”

“Not good enough!”

She gaped for a moment at the interruption, then scoffed. “So after all your claims of love, you had rather die than be with me?”

“You’re twisting my words!”

“Really?”

“Really! I would _not_ rather die than--”

“Then you’ll eat the apple?”

“Yes!” Tony said defiantly.

Loki quirked an eyebrow.

“No!” he instantly corrected, realizing what he’d said.

“You really will give it all up just because you won’t trust me!” she accused. “When before now, I’ve never so much as _asked_ for your trust. _Do you even_ \-- ?”

“I trust you enough for _one_ lifetime!” Tony said sharply, right hand slicing through the air palm-down to emphasize the cutoff.

Loki looked stricken.

She hid it quickly, face smoothing over to non-expression just as Tony deflated at the hurt he’d glimpsed, hand and shoulders slumping. “...Which is a lot more to _me_ than it is to _you_. Loki.”

Loki stood, crossed her arms tightly in a gesture not quite like huddling against the cold, and walked away.

“Loki. Loki, I’m sorry. I’m an ass. I didn’t think about how that that would sound and…. Look, until a minute ago, one lifetime was all I thought I had to offer you. It was everything. I want to give you everything, but I… I wasn’t prepared for this, okay? Let me think about it.”

Loki stopped, nodded once without turning back, and vanished.

Tony knew it was temporary.

Loki needed to mope.

Then she would be back.

He greeted the panic welling up in his chest with resigned familiarity, and sighed tiredly as a voice in the back of his head took up screaming that she had left him again.

.:.

Peter stopped by his room after school, intending only to quickly deposit a few belongings and double-check that his personal hygiene met certain kissability standards before meeting Gwen at an ice cream parlor down the street. But he stilled in the midst of plugging in his laptop to charge, staring down at the desk space usually left vacant for his computer.

There was a photograph on the desk that he hadn’t put there. Picking it up as he set the laptop down, he felt a funny dropping sensation in his stomach, vindictive and horrified both.

It was a photograph of a blond-haired man sitting in a tattoo parlor, right arm reaching up toward and behind the camera’s view to take a casual and poorly composed selfie. The tattoo artist next to him had his back turned, bending down over the blond's left wrist to decorate the inside with a small, simple design of black ink.

Over the photo, a deliberate, green “X” had been drawn through the blond man’s face. A message from Peter’s mother that required no mental exertion to decrypt.

He sat heavily in his desk chair, frowned, pulled a few pieces of paper from underneath him to deposit on the desk, and sagged down in the chair again, surprised to find himself feeling queasy and unnerved.

It had been so comforting, before, when Tony had promised him this man’s death. But now, faced with the reality of it, sure and cold and irrevocable, it wasn’t nearly as satisfying or as clean a thing to think on.

Peter briefly tried to pull himself together, to gather his thoughts and recall which belongings he needed with him on the journey down to meet Gwen, to shove this aside enough for the simple innocence of romance and ice cream… Yeah, no.

Instead, he dug out his phone, rocking forward and shaking his head at himself as he dialed, pressing his forehead to his knees and holding his breath and waiting through one ring, straightening up again when the second ring cut short.

“Yeah?” his favorite voice inquired simply, knowing it was him.

“Gwen, can you actually come meet me here? Um, at my house?”

He felt like he managed to sound steady enough, but apparently not, by the concern in Gwen’s voice when she said, “Peter, did something happen?”

“Um…” On what simple scale could he measure and communicate the badness of this? “Everything’s okay,” he assured her in a rush. “Everything’s okay, everything is totally fine, except that I’m just a little bit emotionally not totally fine. Only a little, and, um… No one who we care about is hurt or in any danger, so, y’know, it’s all… okay.” He leaned his head down against his knees again, suddenly feeling hugely stupid. _A little bit emotionally not totally fine_. What kind of a dumb excuse was that to cancel a date?

“I’ll be right over,” Gwen said, and she sounded serious, like she found nothing dumb or inadequate in his explanation.

He had the best girlfriend.

.:.

The two sat on the floor of Peter’s room together, while Gwen held the photo and stared at it, and Peter explained that the man in it had been the one to kill his uncle, how Peter had been hunting for him, and Loki had gotten there first. “It’s my fault,” he concluded. “This is more than just my fault, this is… what I wanted.”

Gwen placed a comforting hand overtop of his. “Are you sure you wanted this?”

Peter pressed his lips together and shook his head, looking to the ceiling for answers and finding blank white wall. “I thought about it, I was… I don’t know. I don’t know what I was gonna do. I thought it was this. I dunno.” He smiled unhappily. “And it was Mom, so. I mean, she wouldn’t have made it quick.”

“So, you didn’t look at the back?”

“Huh?” Peter scooted over to lean his chin on her shoulder and look down, following her gaze as she held the paper white-side-up. There was a short note scrawled on the back.

_He didn’t suffer._   
_Tony indicated that might ease your mind._   
_~ L_

Peter read it carefully and snorted. “So glad it’s not an acronym.”

“Anagram?” Gwen suggested as an alternative.

“Doubt it. It’s too long for the sentence structure to be clear if it was.” He sighed. “It is what it seems.”

Gwen reached up and set the paper down on Peter’s desk. “Did you actually ask either of your parents to do this?”

He had to think through his memories to work out the technicalities of his answer. “No. No, Tony said he would, and… and then, this was actually Mom, so I don’t know for sure if they even talked about it, but…. But maybe this wouldn’t have happened if I’d told Tony not to. They might have talked. I might have been able to….”

Gwen shifted backward a little so that she could rub soothing circles over Peter’s back. “Then I don’t think you’re responsible for someone else’s actions.”

He laughed out loud at that, a sound thick with irony and genuine, grieved amusement. “Yeah. Well, by that logic, it’s not my fault that uncle Ben died, so….”

Gwen looked at him, steady and expectant.

Peter sobered. “...O-oh.” He looked quickly down at his hands, avoiding her eyes now.

“That man who killed your uncle. Would you really even want to bring him back if you could?”

Peter shrugged helplessly, unable to come up with a straight answer. “I have an obligation…. If I can do good things for people. I have an obligation to do those things.”

Gwen shook her head. “No. You don’t have an obligation. You have a _choice_. You choose to help people, when you don’t have to. It’s a lot of why I love you.”

She took a breath and forged on, “But you _can’t do it all the time_. You can’t do everything right, you can’t prevent every death, and you can’t always say the forgiving thing just because not all of you wants revenge. You can’t keep that up. No one can.” She tugged down his head so it rested on her shoulder again. “Give it a break, Peter. Give yourself a break.”

Peter willingly leaned his forehead into her shoulder, body falling slack in an attempt at obedience. “I’m glad he’s dead,” he whispered against the sleeve of her blouse, hating that fact even as he spoke it.

“Of course you are.”

“And I’m sorry. I’m so sorry for so many things.”

“Of course you are.”

Ben was dead, and so was his killer. There was nothing more to be done, no means of reversal, no reprisal or atonement to seek.

He had lost something. Simple as that. And it was a hard, precarious balancing act, trying to hold that knowledge in his mind and not push past it to either turn the blame inward or plan some further act of cleansing horror.

He shifted enough to wrap his arms around Gwen’s waist and pull her closer, breathing in the scent of her hair. Grounding himself while he tried to ease into that balance, the pain and the effort of holding it. There was burning shame at what he was letting her see in him, and burning acceptance when she didn’t wince away from any of it.

And the pain did start to fade, after a few long minutes of sitting and breathing in it. His chest was tight with grief, but the tension eased like the tide going out, slow and quiet. In, out. In, out.

He became slowly aware of how nice it was, to have Gwen wrapped up close against him. The simplicity of it, the warmth.

The things they shared that made it all so perfectly _not simple_. Secrets and trust and frustrations. The engaging details that made life more than a dull and lonely alternative to the world as it had been before one particular death.

He shifted to sit up straighter and tightened his arms to pull her closer, tugging until they were mutually leaning against each other, and it wasn’t so much just her supporting him.

“Hey,” he greeted lightly, by way of informing her that he’d trudged through the worst of his internal trials.

She giggled at the casualness of his tone. “Hey.” She turned to face him where he now held his head just a little higher than hers, and nudged at his chin with her nose, making him grin against his will. “Better?”

He kept grinning and rewrapped his arms around her, pulling her even closer, amazed by how aware he was of the warmth of this moment, like his world had been scrubbed raw until even happiness was vivid enough to sting. “Yeah,” he said quietly into her hair.

They were content to sit like that for a few minutes, enjoying a far more comfortable silence than the one that had come before.

Eventually they shifted, stirred by boredom, and Gwen mused a question aloud. “I wonder why this happened now.”

“Which?”

She pulled back enough to look at him. “Your mom. Loki. What he did. I thought he was focusing on stopping Dr. Killian. Of all the times to catch up on old revenge, why do you think he did this now?”

Peter shrugged, feeling strangely zen about the whole thing now that he’d had a chance to fully react. “Knowing mom? She probably just needed to blow off steam for some reason.”

“Eek.” She grimaced a bit.

He laughed a bit at her reaction, and then changed the topic. “So. Still want to get ice cream?”

She squinted at him, taking in the state of him as she considered her answer. Then she nodded and said, “I’d love to.”

.:.

The next evening found Tony sitting on a stool at one of the higher tables in his lab, contemplating a glass of 1978 single malt. He thought, _alcohol never tried to leave me_ , and abruptly felt like a cliche.

He heard footsteps, the distinctive click of Loki’s heels in her female form, and felt his shoulders fall slack, most of the tension leaving him at the reassurance that she hadn’t left. That tension would be back, of course.

Loki said, “I thought you gave up drinking.”

“I did. Sixteen years sober. Got coins and everything.” He spun the glass on the table, eyes still fixed on it.

“But a few days with me - ”

“Don’t do that,” Tony said sharply. “This whole _us_ thing isn’t supposed to be easy. It wouldn’t be right if it were easy. And if I didn’t need to be drunk to live without you, I _definitely_ don’t need to be drunk to live _with_ you.” He’d heard enough stories of relapse to know that wasn’t always sound logic, but in this case, he was certain of his words. And it was part of Tony’s nature that saying it aloud made it more true, gave him something to prove.

“Then why?”

He spun the glass again. “I swore I was going to be sober for the rest of my life.”

“Admirable of you,” Loki stated cautiously.

“Sixteen years is a long time. Life is a _really_ long time.”

“But a few millennia with me…” Loki realized.

“Now you’re starting to get it.”

Circling him, she stepped into his field of vision. “It’s a long time to hold yourself to such an oath.”

“Figuring I get offered a drink every month for one thousand years, that’s twelve thousand renditions of no-I-would-not-like-a-dry-vodka-martini-with-extra-olives-but-thanks-for-asking.”

Loki settled onto a stool opposite him and rested a hand under her chin with glum grace. She touched a finger of her free hand to the rim of his glass and they both watched passively as the liquid flowed inward to form the shape of a frog, which then croaked quietly and hopped out of the glass.

“Two conditions,” Tony said at length.

Loki’s eyes brightened with hope and suspicion. “Alright.”

“One: You have to marry me before I eat the pie.”

She bobbed her head lightly in unsurprised acquiescence. “It will keep.”

“Two: Peter says you have other kids. I want to meet them.”

After a stunned moment, Loki glanced away and down, calculating.

“Or, some of them.”

“Why?”

“Well, it’s something you do if you’re planning to spend forever with someone. Introduce them to the kids. And meeting Peter was….” Tony paused and selected his words more slowly. “I have a hypothesis, that for every one of your offspring a person is acquainted with, life becomes more... worth... living.” He narrowed his eyes as he watched her carefully to see how she would take the compliment.

Loki’s eyebrows drew together in a look of consternation that Tony was learning to read as _how could you possibly have known to say that_ , and he caught the telltale shine of tears in her eyes. Happy tears.

Score.

She swallowed thickly and looked away, considering again. “That may take time,” she said, voice coarse.

“Well, it just so happens I’m likely to have a lot more time than I know what to do with.”

As that sunk in, Loki grinned a helplessly brilliant grin that dislodged the tears from her eyes so they fell along her cheeks and left water trails in all the crinkles of her smile.

Tony reached across the table. He needed to touch that smile, he really did. His fingers found her chin and his thumb traced up over her cheeks, smearing the wetness across her skin so it grew rapidly cold, a thin surface of water exposed to air. “You know,” he said conversationally, “I’d move heaven and earth to get you to smile at me like that.”

Loki looked up at the heavens and down at the earth, and tossed him a mocking, expectant look, still smiling. Tony returned the smile and his shoulders shook with a low, involuntary giggle that made his head fall forward.

He looked up at her again with warm sparks of humor bright in his brown eyes. His fingers traced along her jaw once the tears on her face were all dried away. “So, future Mrs. and/or Mr. Stark… How would _you_ like to spend the next few hours of forever?”

Loki pulled up an arm to press his hand more firmly against her face as she replied with a thoughtful hum. “Have you managed to get any sleep?”

“A bit. Enough,” Tony corrected as he realized why she was asking. “Tons. Did nothing but sleep.”

“Oh, good.” Loki laughed again as she stood, folded his hand into hers as she lowered it away from her face, leading him away from the table.

There was a pile of mats in the corner of the room that Tony sometimes laid out when he thought a project might result in him falling down a lot in the testing phase. (Or that his bots sometimes laid out when he worked himself past exhaustion and they feared for his safety. It tended to result in Tony tripping and falling because he didn’t know where his stuff was, but the thought was nice.)

The mats were large enough and, just now, neatly enough stacked that they did pretty well work as a makeshift mattress. Loki coaxed him to lie down on top of them as she leaned over him and kissed him fit to take his breath away. Tony found had no complaints about her choice of surface.

A few minutes passed in confusion and warm lips and intoxicating friction. The next time Tony was clearly aware of anything, Loki was straddling him and trying to tug his shirt free of his arms while he leaned up to remove her shoes from her feet where they rested on either side of his knees. Tony’s hands fumbled reverently through the task, but he was inevitably clumsy in his attempts, what with his and Loki’s conflicting strategies to undress each other at the same time.

They fought a brief tug-of-war that ended with a lot more frenzied kissing, deep and messy.

She gripped him by the upper arms and pressed him flat down to the mat and he was lost again. Soft lips and the darker grip of arousal low in his gut, but it pulled so gently, gentle enough not to break him.

She ravaged his mouth, the slide of teeth over lips and darkness as her hair fell around him and her warm weight over his thighs and shoulders all making up a trap he couldn’t escape unless she let him. He was stuck and taunted by clever lips and teeth and tongue that laid claim to him in a way that probably should have made him uncomfortable. It really just made the fit of his pants uncomfortable.

He belonged to her now, he realized, in a new and far eerier way with the bargain they’d just struck. He’d traded away his own death, and the thought made him shiver. He felt her smile and nip at his upper lip and that made him shiver harder.

She owned him. She had him whole and pliable and weak and mortal and tough and permanent. Proprietary hands were sliding his jeans down over his waist and his boxers down over his erection, and the way she was kissing him it was like she could breathe the death right out of him and he’d be just as happy as long as she was breathing him in.

He lost himself to the undertow again, barely noting the sound of a package tearing and the meaning of how her hands moved over his length to wrap it in latex and line it up with her hips.

Before he knew it she was riding him in earnest, a hard punishing rhythm, and he moved with it, thrusting up to meet her. Cool air alternating with the hot press of her all around him.

It was searing, how good that felt.

They picked up speed till it was fast and breathless, with wet, percussive sounds and his heartbeat thundering in his ears and watching the way her lips and breasts and hair shook with the impact every time she let herself fall sharply onto him.

And then she slowed, and that was just mean. He was caught in the moment, attention driven to painfully acute focus as she let the motions of her hips ebb and lose speed, forcing them both into a frustrating pace.

“Wow. Hey. Any way we could….” Tony lost his coherence halfway through the request, laying his head back and helplessly just breathing through it all as he tried to focus. He needed her more and faster, he needed to ask her for that, but the slowness of how she was moving now was (not quite) tearing his mind apart in the best possible way. “Wow.”

His heartbeat was still pounding loud in his ears, but now it was a contrast of rhythms, too many heartbeats going into one rise and fall of his partner’s body over his own. He couldn’t seem to get his breath back.

“Were you going to ask for something, Tony?” Loki asked, and she was grinning with the power of it, her cheeks flushed bright with effort and arousal.

Tony opened his mouth to ask for _More, faster_! and exhaled sharply as she moved down onto him in the next slow thrust, finding himself oddly mute (not a normal feeling for him), as he tried to organize his scattered train of thought.

Loki slowed to a complete stop, settling her hips over his, pinning Tony down hard so he was held in place, unable to move, while everything in him, his blood pounding in his heart, _demanded_ that he move. He was caught. And she just looked down at him expectantly. “Yes?” she asked, prompting him to finish his thought. As if she were only being polite.

When Tony finally managed to speak, what came out was a strained, desperate, “Oh, _fuck you_ ,” that had her laughing breathlessly as soon as she heard it.

Tony had an odd flash of memory, of resolving once to make her laugh like that by the end of the evening and not making good. Things never did seem to go the way he planned when she came into the equation (and dammit he _still_ hadn’t figured out when she’d used magic before), too many variables and too many smug grins and never enough time or touch or enough motion to puzzle her out.

“More,” he said at last. (And he managed to catch her eyes as he tried to convey how true it was.) “I need more.”

“Really?” She started moving again and he made a helpless noise as relief and pleasure washed across his skin. (And she caught his eyes right back and held them like a gaze was something you could grip hard and break.) “So do I,” she added at a near-growl, and took hold of the back of his neck to pull him up into a searing kiss.

He was hers, and he could only hope she didn’t break things that were hers.

She’d broken him when she left. But maybe that wasn’t fair to say.

He’d been broken when she found him, and he’d loved her broken, and she’d left him broken. Wholeness was a different matter, a matter of years and work and waiting. Wholeness came slowly, deadly gentle.

And it could hurt more to be whole than to be broken, with more of him present and awake to feel what she was doing. It hurt more when he understood the pulls and risks of falling in love and falling in lust. Feeling old wounds ache and tug, not quite re-opening. Letting himself be pulled in anyway.

She was hot, hot all around him and each thrust was a relief, was cold water on a burn. His hands ran up her ass and the skin of her low back, following the motions and arches of her spine as she rolled up away and down over him again. He reached her neck and buried a hand in her dark hair, and it dislodged and fell around him in a thicker curtain. She pulled away to breathe and he could only just see the glinting of her green eyes in the sudden dark.

She was breathing him in while he fell in lust, in and in and in, arching up without meaning to, the bowing of muscle, insight had and bargain struck. (Friction and sparks and creation.)

They’d just made up after a fight, and it was familiar and right and felt like an answer to an old riddle. (When had she used magic before?) Looking up, and trying to hold it all together. Or trying _not_ to hold it together? Trying to let go? Suddenly he couldn’t remember.

(Oh yeah. That was when.)

He came shuddering into her, and there was heat and settling and warm breath mingling and gasping.

Tony found himself stroking up and down the line of her thighs, unthinking, the way he might brush his own legs when seeking calm, feeling his whole torso expand and contract in shaky motions as he worked to steady his breath. That breath caught in his throat again as Loki shifted her hips with the motion of his sliding out, resettling without moving her head from where it rested forehead-to-forehead with his.

Then there was steadying again, finding breath (coming home), and all he wanted, really, was to keep looking up into her eyes and keep on wanting; but _wanting_ was starting to feel a little more like _having_. (And he wasn’t sure if he recognized that, so maybe it was just the shakiness of his breath; a feeling of everything being rattled and unsteady and that was easy to mix up with something good and unfamiliar and full.)

They lay there until he fell asleep. (Because he hadn’t _actually_ slept very much, that part had been kind of a lie.)

Loki settled into a position curled along Tony’s side. She hadn’t climaxed, but she felt satisfied with what she had taken all the same. The pleasant tiredness of good sex was sinking in to her bones, breath by breath, settling sparks and warm heaviness pooling in her limbs. She fell asleep not long after the human whose life now belonged to her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been a while, huh? Sorry this chapter took so long to post. Life took some unexpected turns, but if it doesn’t take any more, the final chapter should go up in a few weeks.
> 
> And wow, we’ve hit the point with this fic where I can’t always keep up with responding to all the comments. Which is amazing. Thank you guys!


	7. Some People are Scared to See

When the dark-haired, green-eyed woman who had so recently applied for upgrading through the Extremis project came to meet Killian, he was profoundly pleased.

He’d lost so many people and connections in his ill-thought-out alliance with Doom. And he’d appeared on the world radar in a way that wouldn’t serve him without a much larger power base to work with. He needed more soldiers.

Now, here was a perfect candidate.

An ex-military background that checked out beautifully. A confidence in her manner that clearly overlaid a deep hurt that had healed drenched in cynicism. This was the sort of woman who could follow orders, who had skill and discipline and grit -- but nothing remaining of whatever ideals had first inspired her to refine those skills.

When she arrived in his office, he was very pleased.

And when she left his office, when Killian lay on the floor and tried to gasp his last breath into lungs ripped and exposed to open air and too much singed by their own futile healing attempt to bleed out, when he watched her sneakered feet stride gracefully onto the tile of the hallway floor outside, then, if nothing else, he was grimly satisfied with his accomplishments.

Extremis worked. And she would know it.

.:.

Wednesday found Peter sitting alone in Pepper’s neat, expansive office, where she had ordered him to finish his homework before he went back to the lab to keep playing let’s-break-the-laws-of-physics-with-more-complicated-physics with Tony.

So here he was, sitting in a big comfy office chair, alternately looking out at New York from a flattering height and looking down at his English homework. Not really a bad place to be banished to for the afternoon.

He got a shock when he looked down and the letters on his book page started sprouting, curling over the paper in a fine black ink pattern of leaves and flowers and spiraling vines. Peter jumped and threw the book across the room and maybe screamed a little bit.

He heard a light chuckle, and looked up to find his mother walking in. She wore her female form as well as dark grey trousers and a plain white shirt.

“ _Mom_ , I was reading _The Yellow Wallpaper_. That’s so mean!”

“Were you?” She frowned down at the book. “Ah, that is overly fitting. Sorry.”

Peter got up to retrieve the book. “So, where’ve you been? Tony was calling you earlier. He was worried because you didn’t pick up.”

“Of course he was,” Loki muttered, unsurprised. Tony’s clinginess was an ongoing point of tension, a side effect of eighteen years’ heartbreak that had no short-term solution. “I was infiltrating a network of genetically enhanced firebreathing humans. Made it a _bit_ hard to pick up the phone. At any rate, Killian is dead. And your virus has infiltrated all the programs capable of synthesizing Extremis.” She raised her eyebrow, clearly expecting praise for her accomplishment.

“ _Wow_. That was quick.”

She smiled, pleased.

“Seems almost too easy,” Peter muttered. Before Loki could reply to that, he went on, “We should let Tony know you’re here.”

She pressed her lips together abruptly, the shadow of a wince. “Not yet, love. I need your help with something first, and I’d rather not worry him. Unless worry proves the appropriate emotion.”

Knowing her well enough to feel a sinking dread already, Peter put down his the book again, looking at his mother more closely. He found her paler than usual, and she was breathing a bit stiffly, hiding pain. “What’s wrong?” Peter asked.

Loki found herself a seat in the spare office chair. “Killian caught onto what I’d done a moment after I installed the virus. He took me by surprise and injected me with some of the original Extremis. I think he imagined he could overpower me. Then I would remove the virus in exchange for access to the more stable serum to help me recover.”

She scoffed at the idea, and then hesitated a bit before finishing, “The injection is having some… unexpected side effects.”

“It’s transforming you?”

“I assumed it would wear off, but it does seem to be worsening.” Loki closed her eyes and sat perfectly still for a moment, brows drawn into a tight frown as she waited out a wave of what looked like terrible physical discomfort.

Then she opened her eyes and contrived to look very nearly well as she went on talking. “I’ve seen a little of the workings of Extremis. It shouldn’t affect me at all. Human DNA and Jotun DNA… even shifted to human form, the effects ought not persist like this.”

“Oh god. Right. I was right that you didn’t know.” Peter threaded his fingers through his hair and tugged anxiously at his own scalp. “Wow, so much has been happening I pretty much completely forgot about that.”

Loki looked at him steadily. “Peter, what do you know that I don’t?”

“Well, when we figured out that I was Tony’s son, I let them look at my DNA.”

Loki sent him a reproving look.

“I know, I know. But here’s the thing: aside from the changes the spider made, I’m three quarters human.”

Loki looked first looked uncomprehending, then disbelieving, then her eyes widened as the ramifications became clear to her. “You were born three quarters human? Not _completely_ human? Not _half_ human where the human half dominated your appearance? But _exactly_ three quarters human?”

Peter pressed his lips together and the corners of his mouth drew up in an expression that bore many of the markers of a smile but was not one. “Obvious conclusion? Three of my grandparents were human.”

“One of my parents.” Her eyes roamed the room searchingly as she put the pieces together. “I was born toward the end of Jotunheim’s invasion of Midgard. The son of a soldier king, who was newly returned home from a foreign world. ‘ _Small, for a giant’s offspring. Left to die_.’ Of course. Of _course_ Laufey abandoned me. What kind of king would raise a child as his own, born of war and all the weakness of the race he’d set out to conquer?” Loki’s mouth curled up into a twisted smile. “It would be cruel.”

“So what happens if you inject Extremis into someone half human and half Jotun?”

Orange light shifted under the skin of Loki’s face, webbed like sunlight bent in rippling water. She set her teeth, suppressing a shudder at whatever pain was sliding through her blood. “Nothing good,” she ground out.

“Shit. _Shit-shit-shit-shit-shit_. Look, I’m smart. I’m gonna figure this out, okay?”

“It’s been too long since I instructed you in telling a believable lie,” Loki said through her teeth.

“I’m gonna _try_. Is there any magic you can do? Like, can you change into something that can deal with Extremis, or just dispel it somehow?”

Loki shook her head, breathing deeply and looking at her son more kindly as the pain faded. “The serum is altering my form and interfering with my magic. What power I have beyond the simplest illusions, my body is already using to keep it at bay.” She leaned forward and took hold of his arm. “Peter, you’re my son and you are more clever than you know. The transformation is progressing slowly enough. Between you and Tony, you _will_ find a cure in time.”

Peter took a fortified breath, smiled and nodded.

She released his arm and leaned back. “See? _That_ is how you tell a comforting lie. Now go fetch Tony; I think we’ll need his help after all. Whatever the odds, I do _not_ intend to die this century.”

“Jarvis, get my dad in here?”

“I’ve informed Master Stark of the situation. He’s on his way.”

By the time Tony arrived, dark blue pigment was creeping across Loki’s skin, and the trickster’s shape was shifting over to that of his male form.

It didn’t look like a voluntary shift. Too slow for that, and Loki’s clothing wasn’t changing with him as it ordinarily would. His trousers fell looser around his hips, and he unbuttoned the top of his simple white blouse to make way for broader shoulders.

Tony looked over the state of his lover as he pushed the door open, working to hide his worry. Working to hide his unease at the unfamiliar blue color of Loki’s appearance. “New paint job, babe?”

Loki looked at Tony carefully through alien red eyes. “It’s my body’s way of recoiling from Extremis. I’ve turned back to the form I was born to: Male Frost Giant.”

Peter smiled, pained, but also with a little of the brilliance of a man remembering a thrilling wonder from his early childhood. “Blue Mommy,” he quoted his younger self with unsteady warmth.

Loki sent him a sideways look that tried very hard to be disparaging, but broke halfway through and morphed into something very soft.

“We could try the stabilizing serum,” Tony suggested.

Peter shook his head. “No way. If anything, the second serum is more finely tuned to human physiology than the first one was. Who knows what it would do to her?”

“Him,” Tony corrected and closed the door after himself. “Currently. Wait, is that even how it works? You’ve always changed on purpose before, so….”

Loki rolled his eyes. “Tony, I’ve spent the larger part of my life in one guise or another, and not always by choice. Do you really think I care about being misgendered _now_?”

“Yes,” Tony replied without hesitation.

The god blinked, taken aback by his perceptiveness.

When Loki didn’t immediately offer an answer one way or the other, Peter plowed on with the topic at hand. “We would need to use mom’s original DNA to reverse engineer the original serum from scratch. It’s either that or wait it out.”

Loki shook his head at that, once again drawing on the certainty of a shapeshifter in his own body. “My physiology is going to reject Extremis. It’s only a matter of time.”

“So we reverse it,” Peter concluded. “I’m gonna need a DNA sample.”

“Jarvis,” Tony called, “Get Bruce down here with the swabs again.”

Peter stood, pacing anxiously as he further thought the problem through. “There’s different tests I want to try. At some point we’ll need a blood sample to test a new serum on.”

“I will inform Doctor Banner to bring a variety of testing equipment,” Jarvis agreed.

Tony sat in the chair Peter had vacated, pulled it up close to Loki and reached a hand out to his shoulder. There was some anxiety and hesitation in the gesture. It could be worry that a touch would worsen Loki’s pain as easily as it could be unease at his fearsome, alien appearance. Tony wasn’t sure himself.

Either way, Loki leaned into the touch, and Tony relaxed a bit, rubbing his hand up and down the god’s back through the thin white cloth of his shirt.

Cold. Frost Giant. Made sense.

Bruce arrived after a few minutes with a few bags of medical supplies. The tension in the room eased a bit with the addition of the focused, even aura of a doctor who was determined to think about nothing whatsoever other than being a doctor. He asked a few questions about Loki’s condition, and swabbed the crook of his arm down with disinfectant to draw blood, in addition to a cheek swab and a hair Loki plucked from his own head.

Then Bruce was gone again, and took with him some of the calm he had brought into the room.

“Jarvis, where’s Pepper?” Tony asked curiously just after the doctor left.

“Pepper will be in a meeting for the next several hours. Shall I inform her--?”

“Nah, don’t bother. Nothing she can do about this,” Tony muttered, still rubbing his hand up and down Loki’s back. Then he stilled and gave the god a closer look. “Um, is it just me or are your fingers turning… not blue?”

As Tony watched, his lover’s skin returned to a humanoid hue, and the god took up shivering. A feverish flush crept across his pale cheeks and forehead. From there, orange light began shifting under his skin again, radiating a heat palpable where Tony sat close at his side. And still the god rubbed his upper arms as though cold.

“It’s just you,” Loki said dryly, but the delay before his words and the pained shudder in his voice sort of ruined the sarcastic effect.

By now Peter was on his phone, talking urgently. “Gwen, I need you to drop by my house and get something. There’s a green handbag in my room. It’s, um, on top of the desk, I think. ...Yeah, Stark Tower. ...More in the range of the life and death. No, _I’m_ fine, just... okay. See you soon.”

Loki shot him a light glare as he hung up the phone. “Peter, I still hope _not_ to drag you brothers into this.”

Peter looked at him blankly. “My brothers?”

“Was that not…?” Loki’s eyes widened in realization, then closed quickly in self-directed exasperation. “Oh, of _course_. The healing charm on the clasp.”

“Yeah, that handbag kept my fever down when I got injected with stuff that turned me into a thing, so I thought it might help. My brothers?” Peter prompted again.

“I don’t know why I thought of them,” Loki said, enough confusion and introspection in his tone that Peter nearly fell for it. “I think it was the fever speaking.”

“The handbag has to do with them somehow, doesn’t it?” Peter asked.

Loki gave him a long look, sizing up the viability of a new lie, and finally leaned back with a muttered, “Damn.”

“What is it?” Peter continued curiously. “Was there another card in there I missed?”

“No. And I’d prefer not to spea--” Loki cut off as his skin glowed orange again. He tried to come to grips with the pain enough to finish his sentence. “To…”

Tony finished for him with attempted cheer slathered all over his panic. “Not speaking on it! Got it. We’re good. No worries, okay?”

Loki shot his a glare that made it clear what he thought of his lover’s acting, but his tone was entirely genuine when he recovered enough to say, “Thank you.”

The handbag arrived in due course, in the hands of a very worried Gwen, who immediately noticed the state of the god’s health. “Are you okay? Is he okay?” she redirected the question from Loki to Peter, apparently unsure whether the god was capable of answering under his own power.

“I’m quite alright, Miss Stacy,” Loki answered calmly. “Just running a very high fever. If you’d be so kind as to hand me that….”

But he was still sweating, and his hands shook visibly as he reached out for the bag and Gwen set it down in his hands. “It’s heavier than it looks,” she warned.

“Yes, I’m familiar,” Loki assured her as he took the full weight.

She backed away, instinctively granting him personal space. “Is he okay?” she asked Peter again, more quietly.

“No,” the boy said simply.

Loki settled the unaccountably heavy bag in his lap with the care of a hen for her own eggs. He took hold of the clasp, and let out a muted sigh of relief as the healing spell in the metal took effect and his shivering ceased.

As it had with Peter, the charm eased Loki’s fever but did nothing to stop the transformation struggling to take hold in his body. Even as the flush receded from his face, a wash of blue crept across his skin again, painfully slow.

Tony caught himself unconsciously leaning away from Loki’s alien appearance. He called himself every kind of coward inside his head and scooched closer again, taking one cold blue hand in his while with his other hand he resumed stroking Loki’s back.

The change came to an end and Loki’s eyes settled on Tony, that eerie, wild red again. But the mad intelligence in them, and the determination, those were plenty familiar. “Tony, I owe you an apology.”

“Y’ _think_?” was Tony’s knee-jerk reply, but then he shook his head. “Later. I’m not doing the whole ‘deathbed’ scenario with you. Not today.”

“But when else do we ever manage to have an honest conversation?” Loki queried, laughing weakly though the end of the question. Tony chuckled along with him.

Once they fell quiet again, Loki bent his head toward Tony and continued, “No. I _will_ say this. The apple. I’m sorry I tried to trick you. It never occurred to me that this might happen. That I might really leave you alone again. It was thoughtless.”

“Yeah. Yeah, it was,” Tony said. He smiled and pulled Loki’s fingers up to tenderly kiss the cold skin of his hand. The motion was not an absolution, or a claim of forgiveness. Just eager acceptance of what might always lie between them, if they were lucky.

A chime sounded across the room, and Peter started and dug out his phone. “We got test results from Doctor Banner,” he informed them as he paged through the text on his screen.

“And what, pray tell, is the diagnosis?” Loki asked.

Peter frowned as he took in the text in front of him. “Your body’s already completely contaminated with Extremis. The actual transformation hasn’t totally taken effect, but all the samples of DNA large enough to code have been altered. I needed samples from your natural form before the change and… honestly, I think the shapeshifting made it spread more evenly. Normally, someone’s hair would work as a pre-existing sample. But this doesn’t. It’s _weird_.”

Tony rubbed a thumb absently over the back of Loki’s hand as he processed the news. “So what do we need before we can start putting together a cure?”

Peter shrugged slightly. “Uh, more than anything? A sense of what we’re aiming for. We gotta know what ‘normal’ looks like when it comes to Mom’s genetic code, and what changes the serum’s already made. We can take a sequence of _my_ DNA and cross-reference with Mom’s from one of her human forms to get a better sense of what the original is, but there’s a lot of contamination in mine too, and it’s only half the same to start with… and we could use more than he can really spare right now in the way of blood samples to test a treatment.”

Scratching at the back of his head with anxious speed, he finished, “Long story short? We’re gonna need blood and DNA samples from more of Mom’s biological relatives.”

Tony’s face fell oddly blank as he took in Peter’s conclusion. “So we need to talk to Loki’s other children.”

“Yeah,” Peter confirmed.

Tony turned to Loki accusingly. “And you _knew_ that, didn’t you?”

A moment of quiet, then Loki said a bit cautiously, “It had crossed my mind.”

Peter let the hand holding his phone fall to his side as he made the same connection. “That’s why you thought I would drag your other kids into this. Because -- I mean -- I would! If we can get them here quickly, it might help you.”

Loki took a breath. “That comes with more risks to them than you kn-- ”

“You know what?” Peter cut in. “I think I can _guess_ how risky it is. About as risky as it is for _me_ to be around you, right?”

Loki had more success with the disparaging look this time. “It’s not quite the same. _Your_ familial ties to me are not widely known.”

Tony rubbed his face in exasperation. “Dammit Loki, you do _not_ get to die because you weren’t willing to ask your kids for help in time. That’s… too stupid even for you.”

“Nearly as stupid as endangering them before there’s sufficient cause to do so,” Loki pointed out.

“I think we’ve got sufficient cause.” Tony’s hands opened in an expansive gesture, searching for argument, a gesture which ended with both hands pointed emphatically toward their son as he thought of one. “Come on, think of Peter! He actually found _both_ his long lost parents, and they’re going to get married. His life has become a Hallmark Channel original movie; don’t you dare take that away from him.”

“You two are getting married?” Peter gestured between his parents. “For real?”

Tony perked up a bit. “Oh yeah. Yes! We were going to tell you.”

“Seriously?” Peter’s expression broke into a grin. “That’s so awesome! Congratulations. Y’know. If you both live long enough.”

Loki sighed, closed his eyes, and nodded slightly several times in an exasperated _I hear your arguments and take your point_ sort of motion. He resettled the handbag in his lap and pressed his lips together, still visibly hesitating to do whatever it was that would summon Peter’s siblings to him.

Finally he picked up the bag and upturned it just as Peter once had, letting the bottom fall down through the opening with eerie efficacy and weight. “The four of you must give me your word not to speak to the existence of Jor or Fenrir where any else might hear.”

"No one who will tell anyone else," Peter amended, and then contrived to look small as Loki fixed him with a very cold glare. "Kidding! Geez."

"Do I have your word?" Loki pressed.

"Yes, mother."

"Mine too," Gwen added calmly.

"Wait, four?" Tony echoed belatedly. "Who's four?"

"You have my word as well," came Jarvis's voice, partly by way of explanation.

"Oh," Tony realized. "Duh."

Loki looked at him expectantly.

Tony winced. "Keeping things from Pepper actually never ever ever ends well."

"Pepper doesn't count," Loki said in exasperation, then froze and blinked as he realized just what he had said. And that, in fact, she didn't.

Tony noticed, and failed to fight down a smile at Loki's expense. "Jarvis counts but Pepper doesn't?"

Loki reached into the bag and pulled out two heavily decorated throwing daggers. "Just give me your word already."

The inventor examined the artifacts in mild fascination as he replied in an offhand way, "You have my word as regards the aforementioned terms and modifications, which I've honestly kind of lost track of at this point, yadda yadda yadda."

"Good enough," Loki allowed, knowing full well that Tony had a far better memory for bargains and secrets than the man liked to pretend.

The god set the bag down on the floor and then stood slowly, testing the strength of his legs under him as he went. Holding the handles of both daggers in one hand, he pulled away the sheaths and placed them carefully on the desk, leaving him with two live blades. He stepped into the largest available area of unoccupied carpet and crouched down. There were a few unsteady hitches in the motion, the muscles of his legs only stabilizing him sporadically as he bent his legs.

He pressed one knife point-first into the carpet floor, then the other, so the daggers stood side-by-side with their handles pointed toward the ceiling. Loki spoke a few more words in that arcane language.

(Tony was starting to associate the sound of that language with sex now, which was weird in this situation.)

Loki visibly forced his composure back into place as he stood to meet his children, masking any tells that he was in pain.

The knives vanished, very like a mirage dissipating upon closer view. In their place two figures appeared, drifts of fog solidifying into what looked for all the world to be two human men. One was tall and slender, not quite to the extremes of his father, softened by the flow of the Midgardian linen suit he wore, and his hair had more of a wave, almost curling where it fell near his jaw.

The other was shorter, and wore his long, orange-streaked dark hair in complex braids reminiscent of those on Svartalfheim or Nidavellir, and his clothes were dark and would have been almost nondescript if not for the glint of metal or polished bone here and there. A scar was visible across the length of his left forearm, deep enough that the muscle beneath was slight and misshapen next to his right.

"Jormungandr. Fenrir," Loki greeted. "I apologize for calling you here so abruptly. I'm afraid I need your help."

The taller of the two stepped forward immediately, and his arms encircled Loki tightly, welcomingly. "It's good to see you, Mother," he said.

Fenrir lurked close by, looking his mother up and down, as yet unwilling to approach. "It would be _better_ if we could see you when none of us are at death’s door. You look terrible."

Loki and Jormungandr pulled apart, and Loki licked his lips with a silent, self-effacing laugh as he looked to the shorter of his two elder sons. There was no hiding the strange fit of his clothes and the presence of the Jotun form he generally scorned. “Not at her door just yet,” Loki corrected. “But I might have landed myself somewhere in Mistress Death’s front garden.”

Jormungandr frowned in concern. “What can we do?"

"We need some of your blood," Peter said, unwilling to delay any longer. "In your most natural forms, if possible. After that we can reconstruct Loki's genome to stabilize him from the stuff that's trying to transform him. I only had half his genes _before_ my genetics got scrambled with spiders, so... yeah, blood should do it. We hope."

Tony swiveled his chair contemplatively. “We should call Bruce down here for that part.”

Loki’s red eyes fixed him with a look and he said flatly, “You gave me your word.”

Tony’s shoulders sagged incredulously. “Seriously? You’re sick, and I’m not allowed to call the doctor. _Seriously_?”

Fenrir looked from Peter to Loki. "A new brother?" he asked. "Really? You know, if you felt you had a shortage of family to care for--"

"Don't mind him." Jormungandr shot Fenrir a glare, then offered Peter a handshake. "I’m Jor, and this is Fen. We're glad to meet you. What are you called, brother?"

"Peter," Peter answered, pushing past his intimidation. "And if you don't mind, could we get started? Pretty sure Mom is even worse off than he looks."

Fen rolled his eyes. "Of course," he said darkly. “Our natural forms, you said?”

“Yes, please.”

"Well, Peter, before I change, there's just one thing you should know. I don't bite. Unprovoked."

He began shifting then, growing to the size of a small elephant, seemingly all huge, toothy jaw and orange-gold eyes. Pepper Potts’s expansive office suddenly felt a bit more confining.

"Hey, whoa," Peter said. "Hi. Do we even know where to find a vein on this guy?"

"Yeah." Gwen stepped up, nodding decisively through her wide-eyed nervousness. "I wanted to be a vet when I was in middle school. I can handle this," she said, talking to herself as much as to Peter. She dug through Bruce’s bag for gloves, disinfectants, and a needle. "Hi, Fenrir? I'm going to take that blood now. It's... gonna pinch a little. Don't bite me?"

The giant wolf whuffed and shifted to lie down. Tony, watching, recognized the practiced effort the wolf put in to favor an old injury as he shifted his body without relying on his scarred foreleg to hold his weight.

The inventor thrummed anxious fingers on his arc reactor and stood up to speak a quiet aside to Loki. “There’s some reason you couldn’t heal his arm with magic, I take it.”

Loki muttered something low and sharp and not quite audible about the properties of wolf’s blood spilled on holy ground. Tony didn't ask him to repeat it.

Fenrir settled to the floor, great paws stretched out in front of him, and Gwen approached them with the needle and attached vial. She knelt beside him, feeling for a vein along the lower section of one limb, rubbing alcohol over the area when she found it.

"Ready?" she asked.

Fen gave her an impatient look.

“Jor, you’re biting your nails again,” Loki informed the nearest of his sons, and Jormungandr dropped his hand from where he’d started absently nibbling on his thumbnail.

"Okay, here goes." Gwen stuck Fenrir with the point, drawing what she needed, pulling it back out and stepping back. "Thanks," she said, heartfelt, detaching the vial from the needle.

"Was that it?" Fen said, back to his humanoid shape between one glance and the next. "That was hardly anything."

Jor inclined his head. "Midgard's science has gotten pretty impressive," he said. "Especially around that one." He gestured to Tony. "He would fascinate you, Mother, wouldn't he? Peter's father, by any chance?"

“You’ve been frequenting Earth more than I’d advise, Jor,” Loki noted. “Yes, he’s Peter’s father. And soon to be _your_ stepfather.”

Fenrir sent Tony a look both impressed and wryly dubious. “Good luck with that.”

“Thanks.” Tony blinked, still recovering from the elephant-sized-wolf thing. "So that was your _natural_ form? Doesn't look.... Jotun." He looked at Loki with a certain amount of wary curiosity.

"Angrboda was Jotun," Loki said. "They -- _we_ \-- are shifters by nature, and take on the forms of those beings around us during our gestation and infancy. Most of us spend that time around other frost giants. Angrboda and I…. We spent my pregnancy in hiding.”

Tony shot him a _more_ curious look.

“We won’t get into why,” Loki said flatly, before turning to watch his children as he continued the story. “We hid in the wastes of Jotunheim and the forests of Alfheim and Nidavellir. We fought off many a wild creature, and they outnumbered our allies by a wide margin. And so both our children are built for hunting in such harsh wastes, first, and second, for going unnoticed among humanoids."

"I seem to have taken my traits from Nidavellir," Fenrir said, gesturing at his solid but shortish frame, about level with Tony. "Jor takes more after the elves."

Tony looked curiously at Jormungandr, but by now the other of Loki's sons had taken the form an enormous grey snake, several foot-wide coils piled up compactly along where glass windows met the office floor.

"Elves," he said, blinking at the serpent. "Huh."

Jor pointed out with his tongue, on one of his huge scaly flanks, where Gwen should insert her fresh needle in order to draw blood. She bent to do so, hands steady.

Tony watched, feeling a moderate amount of proprietary terror. But Jor’s large reptilian head slid passively to the floor, and he took to nibbling the tip of his own tail in an absent gesture that was strikingly reminiscent of how he’d bitten at his nails when he wore his more humanoid body.

Gwen stepped back with the second vial while Jor once again assumed his human visage.

Peter packed both blood samples carefully back into the case Bruce had brought down. “Alright, Gwen, come upstairs with me and help me get these set up for analysis. Tony…” Peter hesitated. “Okay, please don’t ever, _ever_ explain your answer to this question to me in more detail than is absolutely necessary... but do you have any of Mom’s hair from before this afternoon? Like, on a pillow or something?”

Tony blinked. “I will check,” he said, and quickly stood to step out the door, which he then held open for Peter and Gwen as they followed shortly after.

Fen glanced through the open doorway, then blinked at what he saw. “Is this normal on Midgard?” He gestured somewhat judgmentally at the large stuffed cat that had taken up temporary residence in a hallway alcove across from Pepper’s office door. The thing had four stubby legs and a coat of brown and white fur. A metallic tag dangled from its ribbon collar, declaring its name to be _Ford_.

Loki and Jor craned their necks a bit to see where he pointed, and Loki snorted a laugh. “Not exactly,” he replied --

\-- just as Tony called back, “Yes, this is perfectly normal!” and slammed the door lightly on any possible arguments.

Loki now stood alone in the room with his two older sons. His skin itched for the power to change to a more familiar form and a less conspicuous hue, and his legs were overtired from holding him upright. But he stayed where he was, holding his calm expression, wary of showing any evidence of infirmity. Especially not now, when they’d done all they could and there was little that more urgency could accomplish.

So. Time for the hard part. “Jor, Fen, thank you. We have everything we need, and I’m sorry to have endangered you this long. Doom knows I’m here, and his spies have infiltrated this tower before. He’ll likely have told more of my enemies about my whereabouts by now,” Loki embellished. (Likelihood was relative when considering the safety of one’s children, after all.)

He chose not to mention the added danger for anyone around him if Extremis really did run its course and his blood rejected it. Reminding these two that his death might be imminent would not help his case here.

Now, how could he frame this in a way that might give them an object of annoyance they could combat by doing as Loki wished? “If you leave before anyone has a chance to learn you’re here, any effort he makes to use you against me will be foiled.”

Fenrir had bristled when he started talking, but by the time Loki was done he had calmed himself with all the skill of a man long tired of the same old family argument.

Jor said, “ _No_.”

Loki frowned and opened his mouth, ready to jump into a far more cloudy and precisely crafted torrent of half truths, but Jor was having none of it. “You are _not_ going to convince us to leave before we know you’re alright. No more than _we_ could convince _you_ if our places were switched.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Fen added, voice toneless.

Loki heard the words under those words, the sense of rejection there, and stared at his son in muted shock.

Fen rolled his eyes and shook his head dismissively, still on some level working to leave that can of worms screwed firmly shut.

But the look of concern from his mother did not let up.

“Fenrir,” Loki started, but his body chose that particularly frustrating moment to take up complaining again.

His form changed, beige overtaking blue much faster than last time, but still painfully slow for the sensation of morphing from one species to another. Extremis seared through his cells as it woke and recognized his form as _not like_ , healing what was not broken, metabolizing sugar at speeds fit to char bone and lighting his skin again with that eerie yellow-and-red glow.

Already weak on his feet, the renewed pain left Loki too little strength to stand, and his knees gave out. Jor and Fen rushed to catch him, and he shifted his weight cooperatively forward as they did, so he didn’t so much _fall_ as he did abruptly lean into an unplanned embrace.

Loki’s sons helped him back to his chair, and Fen took the seat next to him, watching his mother in concern, unaware of how much his expression echoed Loki’s from from a few moments prior.

Loki forced a smile. “We might have to finish this conversation another time,” he managed as the door opened again and the other three returned from their errands.

Tony took in Loki’s renewed presentation of symptoms and became positively mother hen-ish as he hovered over his fiance. “You look pale. Are you usually this pale? Can I get you something to eat? Drink? Medicinal tea? I could order literally all the tea in China and have it shipped here. Do you want literally all the tea in China?”

“Oh gods.” Loki lifted his head through obvious pain, looking suddenly horrified by some dawning thought.

Tony rested his backside against Pepper’s desk -- the closest he could come to sitting across from Loki without stealing Fen’s chair -- and focused on Loki, intent and worried. “What?”

Wide green eyes settled on Tony. “I failed to answer a few phone calls, only to arrive home deathly ill. From now on you’re going to descend even further into constant pestering and paranoia, aren’t you?”

Tony gave him a wry look that openly judged him for having even considered otherwise. “Honey, it’s not paranoia if the world really is out to get you.”

Loki’s shoulders slumped in resignation. “If only you could impress that truth upon my children.”

Gwen crouched down and sent three marble-sized metal balls rolling across the carpet, which came to an abrupt stop all at once and then projected holographic images into the air: test results and reference materials and a file with the Extremis reversal serum, open for revision. “Okay, we’ve got scans running and we’ve got Jarvis set up to automatically synthesize and test serums every time we come up with a viable design.”

Tony stepped up into the display and gestured, pulling up a file. “How much information did we get from Loki’s hair mark two?”

Reading over the incomplete results, Peter smiled a bit. “So far it’s actually _not awful_ in terms of being comparable to Jor and Fen’s genes in their natural forms. If the rest of the sequences come back this closely matched, the answer to your question is… a lot.”

They set in to picking apart the sequences, father and son engaging in a brainstorming session to end all brainstorming sessions. They tossed ideas back and forth, they manipulated the diagrams and edited copy after copy of the designs for the reversal serum, and they spoke over each other excitedly as they worked through an abundance of scientific roadblocks and inspired solutions and detours.

Gwen and Loki made comments here and there, spurring new ideas and occasional _why-didn’t-I-think-of-that_ forehead slaps on the part of the two engineers. The room filled with the warm frenzy of discovery and creation, and no one related to Loki through ties of blood or fascination was immune to its mood-lifting effects.

Jor and Fenrir had too little background in the particular sciences involved to offer any real help, but at opportune moments they questioned Loki shrewdly about the fields and technologies at hand. He obligingly explained as much as he could of the complex relationship between the biologies of humans, Frost Giants, and the strange fire-based creatures that Killian had judged to be the next step in human evolution.

And Loki in the act of teaching his children was as much in his element as a pigeon in flight. Dodging smoothly between the two conversations -- one moment playing the expert and the next the amateur -- seemed to distract him well from the pain of his illness.

Or at least, it distracted him for several minutes at a go. Nothing could hold his focus when warm light swam through his body again, made him grit his teeth and lose track of his words until the wave passed.

It took nearly an hour for Tony and Peter to synthesize a few viable serums that tested well when Jarvis mixed them with Jor and Fenrir’s blood, and Loki’s from earlier in the transformation. After that it was something of a waiting game for the AI to synthesize enough of each to treat Loki. The plan was to to test them all at once just before administering the most effective, allowing them to be compared equally to a sample as close as possible to Loki’s blood as it would be when administered.

Tony minimized the display and walked a few steps backward to lean heavily against Pepper’s desk again, exhausted by the work. (Or, in his own way, exhausted by the fact of having a moment to rest.) He was less terrified now, in possession of enough of the math to remember that his math was never wrong, and one of the cures they’d concocted would likely work.

He looked at Loki, who was still caught up in conversation with Jor and Fenrir about the benefits and drawbacks of earth’s “old-fashioned but still perfectly viable” methods of modeling DNA. Any number of expressions crossed the god’s lovely face as he spoke to his children. Cool fascination. The slight twitches and micro-expressions of suppressed pain. Eagerness. Melancholy. Amusement.

Jor’s face was slightly more round, and just now made even more different from Loki’s by a wide, easy smile. But whenever that smile dropped away, he looked very much like his mother. Fenrir had a stronger, more angular chin than his father or brother, and there was a bitter twist to him that made his resting face grim and his smiles warmly ironic.

Gwen was still hard at work double-checking the remaining contents of the medical bag and consulting with Jarvis to estimate the best time to draw more of Loki’s blood to test it against the serums and accurately predict the substance’s behavior inside his body.

If this really did work, then they’d all helped save Loki’s life, and it was weird just how… proud Tony felt.

Like it reflected on him. As if they really were somehow his children by extension.

Which was a weird enough concept to begin with. He barely had a right to call Peter his kid. Let alone Gwen or these centuries old myth-people. But he felt it, regardless. And - how had Peter put it?

 _I'm glad you're my family_.

It hit Tony, then, just how much his life had changed. It had probably hit him a few times before, but still.

He knew all too well about what it was to have everything and nothing. And _this right here_ … this wasn’t nothing.

When Jarvis prompted her, Gwen went over to get another sample of Loki’s blood, which she then left the room to test.

News of the results arrived via Jarvis first, that two of the three serums were compatible with Loki’s blood at his current stage of transformation. Jarvis offered them more data on which version proved most promising and why, and Peter and Tony immediately started reading through the documents and arguing about them.

Interrupted almost right away when Gwen came back with the new serum in hand. Well aware of the hurry, she stepped up to Loki without ceremony and asked for his shoulder. He unbuttoned his shirt a little further to push his collar aside obligingly.

Everyone else watched in tense, transfixed silence while she applied disinfectant and pressed the needle under his skin. Loki opened his mouth and worked his jaw as the fluid entered his bloodstream, only just refraining from voicing his discomfort. The shape of complaint, but none of the sound.

He went quiet for several minutes after the injection. The others gave him space, as he seemed to be in pain but also deeply focused. As if the changes to his body’s genetic structure required utmost attention. Which, considering his particular kind of magic and how well he knew it, made a certain amount of sense.

When, finally, Loki did move, he held his right hand up in front of him like he found the sight of it strange.

But his expression suddenly cleared as he snapped his fingers and then he _grinned_ as a green flame obediently sparked to life in the air over his hand. “Hah!”

“Yes!” Peter pumped his fists in the air victoriously. Tony offered Gwen a high five, which she gracefully accepted.

Loki swept his hand aside and changed his clothes with the motion. A simple change, just trading his trousers and white shirt for a very similar outfit that fit the lines of his male body. He leaned back onto his chair again, tired out by that little bit of magic, but he returned the smiles he met as he looked up around the room.

Turning to the chair next to him he met Fenrir’s eyes last, and Fenrir didn’t smile. He just said with absolute certainty, “And now you’re going to tell us to leave again.”

Loki’s wince confirmed that Fen was right. “You know now that I’m well. It was no lie when I said that Doom knew of my presence. This is no place for you to linger.”

Fenrir looked about to argue, but Jor put a hand on his shoulder, and a silent argument took place in the exchange of looks between Loki’s two elder sons.

After a moment, Fenrir conceded and stood. “It looks like you win, Mother.”

Loki answered with half of his previous smile, and that melancholy look made another appearance. “As I always do the arguments I want most to lose. We’ll speak again soon. Somewhere safer than here. We have a conversation to finish, you and I.”

“No need,” Fenrir sighed. His right hand automatically traced the scar across his forearm. “I know what things you intend to say.”

Loki reached out to take his hand, stopping it from its task. “Nonetheless, they must be said,” he insisted.

Fenrir looked surprised, but nodded gruffly without comment as Loki squeezed and released his hand.

It was Jor who spoke. “Mother, I believe you’ve grown up.” And with that he earned himself one of Loki’s most parental glares.

After a few more goodbyes, Jor and Fen each retrieved their sheaths from the desk, stepped back, and vanished, leaving behind two sheathed daggers clattering sharply to the carpet in their place.

There was a moment of quiet, a moment for the relief to sink in.

Loki sat up a bit. “Peter, if you’d be so kind as to return those daggers to their place…”

Peter nodded readily before Loki finished talking and crouched down to collect the knives. “So, I, um, I liked meeting them. Jor and Fenrir? And I’m wondering when we can do that again.” He spoke the words cautiously, but there was determination in his eyes when he stood and picked up the handbag from the desk, waiting for an answer.

Loki sighed. “I tend to avoid situations where everyone I care most about are gathered together like you all were today.”

Tony rolled his eyes, sat back in the office chair Fen had vacated, and took Loki’s hand sandwiching it between his. “Honey, I think that’s called _family_.”

He sent Tony a sidelong look. “Whatever you want to call it, it makes it near impossible to make sure you’re in as little danger as I can manage.”

Peter shrugged, turned the handbag right-way-out, and handed it back to his mother. “Pretty sure that’s actually not your choice.”

Sighing, Loki took the bag and vanished it.

The silence that followed made it easy to hear footsteps approaching down the hall, and the four people in the room only had time to look at each other in the beginnings of panic before Pepper Potts opened the door.

She stepped into her office, blinked, and looked around. “Peter… do I even want to know whether you finished your homework?”

The teenager started and looked around for his backpack, stopped himself, and answered the question. “Nnnnnno. No you don’t.”

Pepper further took in the sight of Bruce’s medical bag strewn open on her desk, and took in the mood of the room. She was all too familiar with the way people look when something strange and life-threatening has happened far too recently to be adequately processed and explained by those involved. “I’ll just turn around and leave and pretend I didn’t find my office full of uninvited guests for now, shall I?”

“That does sound like the thing a perfect person would do,” Peter offered up hopefully.

She nodded and made her exit.

Gwen wryly watched the door close. “This is going to be interesting to explain later, isn’t it?”

“Seriously,” Peter agreed. “What even just happened? Oh man, I have homework!” he realized again, and started hunting around in earnest for his schoolbag.

Gwen’s eyes widened. “Oh my gosh, me too! I left it at home because of--”

“Yeah,” Peter nodded as he scooped up his pack. “Handbags and giant snakes. Weird dream -- _day_ ,” he corrected. He made a face at his own mis-speech and she laughed at him. “ _Anyway_. Need a lift?”

While they talked, Tony continued to sit next to Loki, holding his hand and running a concerned palm up and down the god’s forearm. “Just so we’re clear: You’re actually okay?”

“Yes,” Loki assured him.

“You’re _actually okay_?”

“Yes.”

“You’re sure?”

Loki rolled his eyes warmly and did not deign to answer again. “Question for _you_ : Did meeting my children have the effect you expected?”

In essence, _Did it make eternity seem more appealing_?

Tony paused to consider. “I wouldn’t exactly call that what I _expected_ ,” he quipped, but the warmth in his eyes and the unrepentant grin under his words were as good as an answer.

He turned to look at Peter and blinked a few times when he found the teenager nearly finished the task of donning his Spider-Man costume over his clothes. “Dear lord, our son has disappeared and been replaced by a well-known superhero.” It was a lame joke, but Tony said it on such a perfect deadpan that he still earned a few chuckles from his stress-weary family.

Peter paused halfway through pulling on his mask. “I’m taking Gwen home. The windows open, right?”

“Yes they do,” Tony confirmed and went to help them out.

Once Peter was off down the street, a happily shrieking Gwen in his arms, Tony closed the window after them and turned to face Loki, crossing his arms. “You are actually okay though?”

Loki rubbed his face in a very put-upon way. “Exactly how many times are you planning to ask that?”

“Oh, by my figuring… about twelve thousand times.”

.:.

In the days that followed, several of Killian’s followers turned themselves in to SHIELD. The Extremis booster serum, they explained, seemed to have stopped working -- at least any of it that was synthesized after Killian’s death.

And the subjects knew well what could go wrong with a malfunctioning Extremis serum. Fearing a fiery death, they threw themselves on the mercy of law enforcement.

In most cases, only to be informed that the serum’s effect on them had already been reversed.

It provided SHIELD with enough leads to track down the last of Killian’s network before any more not-bombs went off, and that was the end of the matter.

.:.

Loki stood outside next to her youngest son and did her best to stare down a doorknocker.

The doorknocker was winning.

She’d recognized the red brick house two doors down as the one where she and Peter had lived when he was a child. From the front, it was almost identical to the stoop on which she now stood, surrounded by white fencing, confronted by a large door of glass and black-painted wood.

May’s door.

“Do you want me to go in first?” Peter asked.

Loki nodded, and waited alone on the steps while Peter unlocked the door and stepped inside. “Aunt May! Are you upstairs?”

There came the sound of May’s voice muffled by distance and wall, then descending footsteps, and Peter adding, “I brought a visitor, is that okay? She’s at the door.”

“That’s fine, Peter. Is it Gwen again?”

“No.”

And the house’s occupants appeared again in the doorway where Loki could see them. May had aged, lines and cares appearing on her face, and they suited her beautifully. Love and motherhood had worn grooves in her expressions, and it made Loki remember why it had always felt so natural to lean on someone who was ostensibly so young.

The woman stilled when she caught sight of her guest. “Runa?”

The god’s expression twitched just a bit at the sound of her old alias’s name. “It’s Loki, actually,” she corrected, a bit weakly.

May nodded in ready acknowledgment of her momentary lapse in memory. “Of course, yes, Peter told me before. Well, don’t just stand out there. Come in, come in!” the woman urged, gesturing Loki through the door and standing aside a bit further to make clear that there was space.

Loki blinked and stepped forward as she was directed, turning to watch May close the door after her.

What must this woman think of her? She had left, of all things, a _child_ on her doorstep, only to disappear and leave undone half the work of raising a son. And May had picked up where she left off, had lost a husband, had been left in the dark. Because of Loki.

The door clicked closed and that familiar, aged face turned to her again.

“May,” Loki tried, and a greeting or apology should have come next but nothing seemed adequate.

So she had said nothing else when May stepped forward and wrapped her in a tight hug, which the god returned, thoroughly confused.

May didn’t let up on the hug at all, only rocked them a bit from side to side, while Loki stared at the closed front door, still at a loss. After a full minute, she got up the courage to say guardedly, “You must be planning to yell at me at _some_ point.”

“I’m just so glad you’re alright,” May whispered simply.

Loki laughed in disbelieving awe. “Damnit, you’re worse than Frigga.”

There were approaching footsteps from the side and then Peter’s voice. “Alright, guys, I’m gonna get in on this hug, okay?”

With Loki in her female form (and wearing flat shoes today), Peter was actually taller than both women, and his arms wrapped easily around the tops of their shoulders. Loki was wrapped up in limbs and warmth, and the thought kept running through her head, _This isn’t what I expected_.

.:.

For Tony, it didn’t come as much of a surprise when Bruce, Thor, Steve, Clint and Natasha sat him down in the conference room with varying looks of concern and grimness, and Steve took the lead and said simply, “We need to talk about Loki.”

“Yeah, we do, don’t we?” Tony sighed, fiddling with his phone so it clacked lightly against the conference table.

He caught the other Avengers exchanging relieved looks that he wasn’t dismissing the conversation out of hand, and felt momentarily sorry for them. He had yet to tell them the good news.

“Then you know you have to end it?” Steve questioned. “This whole thing’s a conflict of interest, it’s a danger to the team--”

“We’re getting married,” Tony cut in.

The fact that a few pairs of shocked eyes flicked immediately between Tony and _Steve_ was unnerving on several levels.

“ _Loki_ and I. Are getting married,” Tony clarified to the table at large.

The announcement was met with quiet, and uncomprehending stares, and incredulous, wry expressions from those whose features tried to follow the painful twists of their minds as they digested that news. Bruce raised his eyebrows a little, less surprised than the rest but still not entirely sold.

Then the other four traded questioning looks, and Clint was the first to take a guess as to what was happening. “Some kind of love spell?”

Tony opened his mouth to deny that emphatically, then went still. “Oh, that would explain _so much_ ,” he realized aloud. Then he came to his senses. Or the other things that weren’t his senses. “But no. Unless it is, in which case, you can leave it on. All good here.”

“Tony,” Steve spoke his name with the placating tone of one trying to reason with a madman. “Let’s think about this. How long have you known this guy?”

“Yeah, Tony,” Natasha echoed far less rhetorically. “How long _have_ you known this guy?”

“Um. A month or two. Or five. Or eighteen years… It really depends on how you count!” he argued defensively as his fellow Avengers continued to look at him more dubiously.

Clint folded his arms. “Just how complicated is this?”

“Fine. Fine, look. He’s Peter’s mom,” Tony admitted.

At that, Natasha, Steve and Clint just looked at him blankly, like they were all out of reactions to give.

“Is this a joke?” asked Steve.

Bruce raised his hand. “Actually I, uh, I’ve seen the DNA match-ups. It’s true.”

Thor’s eyes lit just a bit. “Peter Parker is my nephew?”

Tony frowned. “I... Yeah, I guess that’s one way of looking at it.”

“Am I the only one who’s still stuck on ‘mom’?” Clint asked without inflection.

“No,” said Natasha and Steve, nearly in unison.

“Loki has borne two children before,” Thor informed them. His eyes turned distant and sad. “Both, so far as I know, are lost to us.”

“Dead?” Steve inquired with some concern.

“ _Lost_ ,” Thor corrected, in a tone that closed the matter.

“Yeah, moving on….” Tony said awkwardly.

Natasha leaned forward to look over at the thunderer. “So, Thor, could Tony be under a spell?”

Thor considered. “I would not put past it my brother to stoop so low. Not after all that’s transpired.”

Tony waved his hand in a palm-up motion of agreement.

“Tony,” Thor spoke solemnly. “How long have you loved my brother?”

“Since we met, eighteen years.” Tony bit his lip. “I _really_ don’t think its a spell, though. I mean _yes_ , he _would_ do that, and _yes_ it _was_ kind of love-at-first-sight, and _yes_ he _was_ clearly using some kind of magic to mess with my head early on there…. Um.” He frowned again as he glanced around at the looks his friends were giving him.

 _But he’s been so damned terrified of believing I love him. That’s not how you are when you’re in control of someone else’s feelings_.

“...But I really don’t think it’s a spell,” Tony repeated unconvincingly.

Thor sighed, thoughtful. “If such an enchantment has not worn away after eighteen years, I doubt it can be removed at all. If Loki truly spelled Tony to love him, he did so by altering the nature of his heart. Nothing else would last so long. There is nothing to be done about it.”

Natasha nodded and turned her eyes from Thor to Tony. “Congratulations, Stark. You’re getting married.”

“ _Thank you_ ,” Tony replied in a pointed tone that criticized everyone else in the room for not having offered their good wishes sooner.

Steve was still looking at Thor. “‘The nature of his heart.’ So you’re saying that whether or not it was magic, the guy we’ve been fighting alongside all these years is just _the kind of guy_ that would fall in love with Loki?”

“Yes,” Thor confirmed.

“Swell,” Steve muttered. To Tony he said, “It looks like we can’t stop you.”

Tony stood, sighed, and smiled off into space. “I always love hearing those words.”

He made his way over to the door and turned the handle, well aware that the conversation couldn’t possibly improve for him beyond this moment. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, there’s work to be done. Weddings, gods, robots… you get the idea.”

Tony closed the door and took a deep, wide-eyed breath of relief at being through with that conversation. Now he could get back to his usual coping mechanisms. Avoidance and science.

Speaking of. The engineer looked up and called out a summons when he saw a certain couple walking away down the hall. “Intern Offspring! Intern Not-offspring!”

The two obediently stopped walking, and Gwen turned to Peter. “Remember when we had names?”

Peter nodded. “It was a brief but... _beautiful_... period in our lives.”

Tony walked between them and clapped his hands. “Chop, chop. Come on up to my lab. I’ve got a project for you two to help out with.”

“We were running an errand for - ” Gwen started.

“It can wait,” Tony said without hesitation, already leading the way. “We three are going to brainstorm testable hypotheses on the nature of AI personhood. We’ve got four AIs, three humans, and no time. Follow me.”

“Why no time?” she questioned as they fell into step behind him. “Is this about Jill?”

“We have tons of time,” Tony amended. “I actually just said that for dramatic effect.”

“You want us to help study Doom’s android, don’t you?” Peter asked flatly, reiterating Gwen’s guess.

“Well, at least to help me figure out how much is _An_ and how much is _Droid_. Also, she’s not actually here. You’re gonna help me study the study.”

“You still think she might be sentient,” Gwen realized.

Peter tossed her a look. “Mom says she isn’t.”

Tony turned around without losing his stride just to give his son a _look_. “Peter, this may come as a shock to you, but your mom doesn’t always tell the truth.”

“Why not just take Jill apart to find out?”

Gwen fielded this one. “Because disassembling something without its permission to figure out if it’s sentient is an action that assumes it isn’t sentient.”

“Bingo.”

“That is a good point,” Peter agreed. “Ethics. Ethics matter. Can we ask Dr. Doom about her?”

Tony pulled in a breath between his teeth. “Doom… mysteriously disappeared from SHIELD custody, and was totally _not_ assassinated by my violently over-protective fiance. Not even a little bit.”

Peter took a breath and summed up. “So we’re going to study something that may or may not be sentient because my mom may or may not have murdered her creator and may or may not have lied about whether or not the thing he created really was sentient?”

“Yep.”

“It’s always going to be like this, isn’t it?” Peter asked suspiciously.

Tony paused before entering the lab and cocked his head. “Specifics?”

“No, just… being part of this family. There’s always going to be creepy amoral implications and one too many unanswered questions, isn’t there?”

The inventor led them through the door into his private lab before answering.

Glancing at the awe on Gwen’s face as they arrived, Peter realized that she hadn’t seen this room before, or at least hadn’t been here before the Extremis insect testing chambers went up and the latest Iron Man suit started taking shape in its full glory near the far wall.

It was a world of wonders they’d just stepped into, gleaming with creation and impossible genius.

Finally answering Peter’s question, Tony crossed his arms. “Probably, but would you really want it any different?”

“No,” said Peter, at the same time as Gwen said, “I think we’re good.”

Tony waved a holotable awake. “Then let’s get started.”

.:.

The night after Tony took the apple, he dreamed of green eyes and dark hair and whispers and rightness.

She was soft black hair fanning across his chest and curved, pale skin warm against him, and she smirked at him with eyes that pierced him and ran him through, seeing too much, slicing his soul open with a pleasant sting.

 _I know you_ , Tony thought.

Said.

Heard.

It was somehow all three, because, well… _dream_.

There was smooth skin, cool under his hands, pressed against his lips. Tasted like aching distance, or maybe stolen treasure. Backdrops and objects and names changed freely without incident and without relevance. There were no constants but this concept of _her_.

And she shouldn’t count as constant at _all_. There was nothing solid here to grip. Shapeshifter. Broken in confusing places. Healed at odd angles. Even that word -- _her_ \-- was a placeholder for something that might morph and slip its hold at any second.

 _I don’t know you_.

It was Tony who said it (thought it?), and the admission struck him with a twisting dread. He was caught in a trap, tricked and cornered, outmaneuvered into stepping easy and unthinking into a yawning pit. Helped along by a playful shove from a teasing lover.

A start and a lurch and suddenly he was really falling, fast and through a world of startling black.

The ground rushed up out of his reach before he thought to grab for it. Around him, everything was pitch dark, the color of it sharp and incisive -- the clear black shine of fangs on a poisonous insect.

Tony felt his stomach clench as his feet sought purchase in a void that only wrenched him downward at a faster clip.

He struggled to breathe through paralyzing fear, through the speed of air ripping past him. Even with the darkness crowding in close as he plummeted, there was nothing solid to be found. Just distance and distance on every side, terrifying and expansive. His eyes searched for shapes and surfaces below, mind spinning off its axis to process nonexistent images and divine some sense of the ground that would rush up to meet him. There was nothing there but eons of shapeless falling.

Forever.

Enough time for his nightmares to catch up with him, for his sins to find him. Just as awful as he’d imagined. Worse.

What had made him think forever was a good idea? Everything familiar was distant past and years overhead. Talk about inadvisable jumps.

Tony caught a glimpse of color out of the corner of his eye.

He blinked and looked around, curiosity momentarily distracting him from the horror of the fall. There was something falling near him. Something that glinted like stolen treasure, shiny and probably forbidden.

At the same time it was also a human form, because, well… _dream_.

Tony’s focus latched straight to her. Recognition. The fear that came with it was a kind that mingled easily enough with the stomach-twisting speed of his fall. Fear of the unknown. Fear of being tricked again. ( _Again_.)

And then there was _desire_ that mingled easily with the breath-stealing speed of his fall. Because, no, he didn’t know her, but he _knew_ her. He knew the long limbs and the intoxication of touching them. He knew the mocking glances and broken green eyes that loved in spite of themselves and eerie red that fought through and bled out stubbornly through pain and lack of recognition.

And he at least knew _of_ the secrets hiding centuries deep under her skin -- he knew the taste of them. He knew the distance, the needing to cross it and get closer.

He caught at her hand and tugged her close, desperate fingers threading through her hair as soon as it was in reach. Clutching and shaking, terror and need. And she helped him along, gripped him close, pressing her palm into his back, then stroking up along his spine, the touch comforting and possessive, soothing as the cool edge of a knife on a hot day.

The cooperativeness, the warmth in her smile, it was like she was trying to distract him from the fear of his fall, like she didn’t know that she appeared just as dangerous. Just as thrilling.

Her hands started wandering and Tony felt himself swear, something reverent and obscene for the warmth and catch of it, because now his skin was bare under her hands. But he hadn't already been naked. And she definitely hadn’t undressed him.

Best he could figure, everything she went to touch just suddenly wasn’t covered, and the memory of being clothed was somehow fake, like the space a mirror summoned for a magic trick. Made up. There was breath and fingers on his skin, too close and knowing for comfort, but the discomfort was a wholly welcome thing.

They were pulling at each other, tangled up and still plummeting, and for Tony the fear took on a thrilling rhythm, pounding through his blood as the sensations combined. A pleasant burn and a rushing fall and the shape of a human frame pressed warm against his own.

Tony resented (loved) the solid contours of her that meant he could only get so close, resented how legs and arms could wrap and catch at skin on skin but couldn’t fuse. There was tugging need in all the little spaces left between them. The fit was all imperfect and contradictory, and Tony groaned at the unyielding lines of her that bent to hold him close but _wouldn’t blur_.

It wasn’t fair. Things shouldn’t be this solid because, well… _dream_.

He crushed her closer, two bodies pressed flush and further until it hurt, muscle and bone bruising the fat and fascia wedged between. He kissed her shoulder and her neck, and up her jaw, and rested the tip of his nose in the crevice between her nose and cheek, lips parted to meet hers but coming up short, tasting at all the things that lay between them. Known and unknown and close-pressed distance. She hooked her knee a little higher on his hip, getting leverage and gripping tight to his shoulders to pull back just enough for her purposes.

An undulation and a shock of wet heat hit Tony like a blow, forcing the air from his lungs as she took him in and pressed her hips close to his again.

He heard himself laughing a little ecstatically (hysterically?) with the thrill of it as they started to move. The stubborn, not-blurry lines and frustrating spaces left between them were suddenly something spectacular, the alternation of grinding, hot _too close_ and wanting, desperate _too far_ , the drawing apart and the gasps for air in the aftermath. Then sharp, fricative collisions. Right back to the grinding, hot _too close_. Sparks scalding in his belly and along his nerves with every thrust.

Their noses were still pressed side-by-side, panting close in each others’ breath, and Tony was transfixed in how her eyes had fluttered shut and could still be so expressive, now rapturing in the motion, now frowning with the effort to push closer.

It was all building and tilting. He was melting away into the rhythm of being buried, and revived, and burned alive all over again.

Finally he pushed his head forward to barely close the space between their mouths, just a brush of lips on parted lips. They jerked together, struck by the softness of it. Something cool and clear caught in the middle of chaos and needy fire. She looked up, meeting Tony’s stare with a shock of green.

A start and a lurch and suddenly he was really falling, orgasm overbalancing what little constancy of perception he’d clung to in lieu of keeping his bearings through the plunge. And it was good, the hot confusion and the rush of it, the sense of being gripped tight and scattered all at once.

It was kind of a good thing, it turned out, this expanse of space for the miles on all sides. The time and distance left him room to gasp and breathe while the heat of it all rolled through him. He was still plummeting, the motion heady with eons of darkness and headier with the smell of familiar sweat and salty skin damp against his mouth and nose.

Breath.

Shaking.

A start and a lurch and the mattress broke Tony’s fall, slamming him free from motion and dream with all the gentleness of solid concrete as he snapped awake.

He was gasping, cold and hot and covered in sweat. The highs of adrenaline and orgasm were still tearing through him as the room settled into his awareness.

Still air and quiet walls.

Softness and twisted bedsheets.

Another breath.

“Nightmare?” A familiar voice questioned in the dark, and Tony turned his head.

The eyes that matched that voice glittered, dim and knowing, reflecting what little light there was in the room. The mischief in that look was good as a confession that she had deliberately haunted his sleep.

Tony rolled over to the woman who was now his wife, pressed close and smelled aching distance and agonizing secrets in her skin. His voice was still cracked from sleep when he replied, “Best dream I ever had.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that’s the end, at long last! Thanks for reading, and thank you so much to those who have commented, bookmarked, and left kudos. This story got an amazing reception, and I’m so grateful. I invite you to check out our profiles here for our other fics, as well as [my personal blog](http://roseapprentice.tumblr.com) on tumblr, which occasionally has ficlets I don't post here.
> 
> As this story is finished and I have no plans to write more, anyone who has a particular itch to criticize the story in the comments or in any other forum has my permission to do so. I do request that you inform me about typos and sentences you cannot follow, and I’m curious to know how the gender-fluid representation came across, as I’m sure it could use work. (I know we were using the wrong tag for a while.) Other criticism is very much permitted, but is not requested, as I’m so very aware of this story’s many flaws that you’d probably be preaching to the choir :P
> 
> If you liked this fic you might also like: [Webs of Lies](http://archiveofourown.org/works/537345) by Like_A_Hurricane, which has smartass family and Lady Loki and was part of the inspiration for this story; [Sleep Until the Sun Goes Down](http://archiveofourown.org/works/977219) by Schadenfreudessa, which I think has a similar flavor of long-lost-love-related frostiron angst; and [Better Teachers](http://archiveofourown.org/works/761887/chapters/1425808) by my lovely co-author qwanderer, which I think has a similar flavor of poignant-but-so-damn-cute frostiron feels.
> 
> ~ Rose

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [I Get Lost In Her Tide](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10525866) by [qwanderer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/qwanderer/pseuds/qwanderer)




End file.
